Msgr. João Scognamiglio Clá Dias Defends the Catholic Church.

On the anniversary of the election of His Holiness Pope Benedict XVI to the Chair of Peter, Msgr. João Scognamiglio Clá Dias Defends the Catholic Church in his new document: "The Church is Immaculate and Indefectible".

"After each campaign of attacks against her, the
Church always emerges stronger and more splendorous than before."

This important and stirring document should be read and studied by Catholics who wish to "...be prepared to make a defense to any one who calls on you to account for the hope that is in you ... so that, when you are abused, those who revile your good behavior in Christ may be put to shame." (1 Peter 3:15-16)

The full text has been printed in five parts in our previous posts below for ease of access, but the full document may be found at:

The full document may be found here:

http://www.arautos.org/desagravo/?lang=en

The Church is Immaculate and Indefectible (Part V)

(Continued ...)

A pastor solicitous for his flock

Some newspapers have tried to implicate Pope Benedict XVI in the concealment of crimes, during his tenure as prefect for the Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith, and some strident voices have gone so far as to suggest his imprisonment.
From our viewpoint, this is the greatest error of the adversary in the current campaign against the Church. Its insolence is what has most caused a generalized indignation, even helping to rouse and stimulate the fervour of sleeping Catholics.

The injustice of the accusers becomes more flagrant when facts prove that is was Benedict XVI, who, while still a Cardinal, did the most to eradicate this problem, a zeal which he has increasingly shown in his occupancy of the Chair of Peter.

The Pastoral letter which he sent to the Catholics of Ireland shortly before Easter, to be read in all the pulpits of the country, is emblematic. In an unprecedented gesture, the Holy Father apologized directly to the victims and their families, expressing his profound dismay for the sinful and criminal acts of the abusers. Addressing himself to the Bishops, he highlighted the “grave errors of judgement” and “failures of leadership” on the part of the Hierarchy. Finally, he emphasized that the Church should resolutely set to work to correct the wrong that was done.
Of equal note is a letter sent in May 2001, by the then Cardinal Ratzinger to the Bishops, ordering that they send him all new and old accusations against clerics. With this initiative, the Holy See took upon itself the investigation of abuses and the punishment of the guilty. From that point, various of the accused had to undergo a complete canonical process, many were dismissed from the clerical state, or voluntarily resigned, while others suffered administrative and disciplinary penalties, including the prohibition to celebrate Mass.

Contrary to what certain sources have rumoured, the letter in question does not prohibit anyone from communicating with the police to denounce possible abuses. In fact, Bishops the world over — including those from the United States, England and Canada — have already adopted procedures for communicating with police authorities, as soon as a case of abuse has been confirmed.

On the other hand, the Vatican has published norms for a more rigorous selection of seminary candidates. Furthermore, it has carried out initiatives such as the Year for Priests which is still in progress, and the International Theological Convention held in Rome at the close of March, with sights on a renewal of the clergy and the elimination of erroneous ideas about the priesthood, caused by a “hermeneutic of discontinuity and rupture,” in face of the Second Vatican Council.
We hope that this breath of renewal will bring some consolation to the victims of these horrible offences committed by men, who, as representatives of God, should be the primary protectors of children and youth. We sympathize with them and share their suffering and frustration, offering our prayers for them. The tragedy that overshadows them has us painfully recall, once again, the countless children, who in Antiquity, were victims of cruel paganism.

From each persecution the Church emerges strengthened

Looking back at her own history, the Catholic Church can say with Cicero: “Alios vidi ventos, alias prospexi animo procellas.”

As in previous attacks, she will emerge fortified from the present melee. Countless reactions throughout the world are already anticipating this outcome. In Ireland and Spain, churches were filled during Holy Week — something that has not happened for many years. In the United States, England and other countries of the West, the number of conversions has increased. Various journalists, many of whom are non-Catholics, took up the defence of the Church. Is it necessary to point out that persecutions are indispensable for the glorification of the Spouse of Christ and essential to her renewal? Thus, St. Paul says: “Nam oportet et hereses esse ut et qui probati sunt manifesti fiant in vobis.” (“For there must be also heresies: that they also, who are approved, may be made manifest among you” 1 Cor 11:19).

To accentuate the perpetuity of the Roman, Catholic and Apostolic Church, Saint Augustine has left us this wise reflection: “The Church will totter if its foundation shakes; but how can Christ be moved? Since Christ cannot be moved, the Church will remain intact until the end of time.”
Let us remember that “God is master of the world and of its history.” It was He himself who decreed that “the gates of Hell” would not prevail against His Church (Mt 16:18).

The full document may be found here:

http://www.arautos.org/desagravo/?lang=en

------------------------------------------------------------------

Msgr. João Scognamiglio Clá Dias, EP, is Honorary Canon of the Papal Basilica Saint Mary Major in Rome, Supernumerary Apostolic Protonotary, Doctor of Canon Law from the Angelicum, Master of Educational Psychology from the Catholic University of Columbia, Doctor Honoris Causa from the Italo-Brazilian University, Member of the Thomas Aquinas International Society (SITA) and of the Pontifical Academy of the Immaculata, Founder and Superior General of three entities of Pontifical Right: International Association of the Faithful, Heralds of the Gospel; Clerical Society of Apostolic Life, Virgo Flos Carmeli; and the Society of Apostolic Life, Regina Virginum.

The Church is Immaculate and Indefectible (Part IV)

(Continued ...)

A civilization governed by the Gospel

The Catholic Church finally won out, by virtue of the intrinsic strength of the good. And, little by little, aided by divine grace which never fails, she took the Greco-Latin decadents and the Germanic barbarians, converted them and educated them, and inspired the building up of a brilliant civilization whose apex, hitherto unattained, occurred in the twelfth and thirteenth centuries.

In this epoch, according to Pope Leo XIII, “States were governed by the philosophy of the Gospel.” Then, “the power and divine virtue of Christian wisdom had diffused itself throughout the laws, institutions, and morals of the people, permeating all ranks and relations of civil society.” The harmonious relation between religious and temporal power, “bore fruits important beyond all expectation, whose remembrance is still, and always will be, in renown, witnessed to as they are by countless proofs which can never be blotted out or ever obscured by any craft of any enemies.”

It was during this time that the Church developed scholasticism, built the Gothic cathedrals (with their stained-glass windows and monuments), created the universities and the hospitals, encouraged the sciences and technical progress, perfected international relations between states, abolished slavery, advanced social progress, raised the condition of women, in such a way that, in the fourteenth century, Europe had far surpassed all the other continents.

As a scholar of medieval technical progress of that epoch illustrates, “it was the building, for the first time in history, of a complex civilization which rested, not on the backs of sweating slaves or coolies, but primarily on non-human power.”

The greater the advances made by historical and scientific studies on this material, the more this truth will come to light and unmask the myth that the Middle Ages was a backward era of oppression. Specialized literature in this field is multiplying.

Why accuse only the Church?

Notwithstanding, there are always minorities at odds with the dominion of virtue, of truth and of good, so that, periodically, the Church sees itself the victim of new onslaughts.

One of the preferred procedures continues to be that of accusing the Church of precisely the wrongs that the world itself is not ashamed to commit. Who are the principal destructors of childhood innocence today? Who promotes an unstoppable pornography, which respects neither age nor dignity, and which incites all types of sexual crimes? Who are the ones exerting generalized pressure on schools to initiate children in immoral practices? Who pushes for changes to the law so that Christian influence may be abolished and substituted with the paganism of old? These questions beg answers; it is a theme worthy of a future study.

Let us consider the accusation of paedophilia. As specialists affirm, based on the latest research, the majority of these crimes are committed in the family home itself, and the abusers are principally the stepfathers, who are followed, sadly, by biological parents, other relatives and by the boyfriends of the relatives of victims. Curiously, never has an adversary of the Church requested a serious study on the relationship between the degradation of the family — the main cause of the existence of millions of stepfathers — and the crimes of paedophilia, or demanded an investigation on the dangers of bringing boyfriends into the house where minors reside.
In passing, it can be noted that the mass of paedophiles is made up of married men. It is also noteworthy that all religions have members involved in cases of paedophilia, and some in gigantic proportions. Why, then, raise an international campaign only against the Catholic Church?

Unmistakable proof of the sanctity of the Church.

We emphasize once again: it was the Catholic Church who, ever faithful to the teachings of her Founder, ended the practice of paedophilia in the West and inspired a horror of it.
Therefore, those who attack the Church in this regard are using against her, a value that is her own, thereby implicitly recognizing that she is unassailable from the standpoint of the counter-values of the world.

In other words, the opponents themselves are providing evidence that the Roman Catholic and Apostolic Church is substantially holy.

The Catholic Church censures the world because it is corrupted. She calls for a high standard of chaste and pure conduct. The thick and fierce onslaught of the enemies consists in accusing her of not practicing the morals that she herself implanted in society. This is the essence of the current publicity campaign with respect to paedophilia.

But how to implicate the Church for the misconduct of a minority of its members? One of the most authoritative studies regarding the problem of paedophilia, by Philip Jenkins, analyses the journalistic techniques that are used to emphasize, not the offenses of individuals, who happen to be priests, but rather their institutional context as giving rise to their behaviour. Suggestive titles, plays on words, and well-studied terms are used, such as, for example, giving a book the attention-grabbing title: “Lead Us Not into Temptation.” In turn, television programs about cases of paedophilia present a background of liturgical ceremonies, Gregorian music and priests in cassocks, so as to stigmatize the Church as a whole, and to produce a visual association between that which is distinctly Catholic and the stereotype of lascivious and shameless priests.
Although doctors, teachers, nurses and other professionals rank high in number among perpetrators of paedophilia crimes, would anyone be so absurd as to accuse all members of these professions, and debase the entire group, because of the crimes of a minority?

Meanwhile, this is what is being done in the case of Catholic priests. The shock that the sexual offences of a priest causes in public opinion — a shock which is warranted, since the Catholic Church is the only institution that expects its members to be spotlessly pure and its priests to be saints — is something that the adversaries know well how to exploit.

The substantial sanctity of the Church

The question remains as to how the Church can maintain her holiness in face of evidence that some priests have committed these grave crimes.

In reality, the strongest argument against the Catholic Church has always been the lives of bad Catholics. However, the presence of unworthy members within the Church of Christ should not cause surprise. Jesus Himself compared His Church to a net that catches good and bad fish (cf. Mt 13:47-50); to a field where the weeds grow together with the wheat (cf. Mt 13:24-30); to a wedding feast, at which one of the guests appears without a wedding robe (cf. Mt 22:11-14).
Nevertheless, the Church will always remain stainless, as Saint Paul emphasizes: “Christ loved the church and gave himself up for her, in order to make her holy by cleansing her with the washing of water by the word, so as to present the church to himself in splendour, without a spot or wrinkle or anything of the kind ― yes, so that she may be holy and without blemish” (Ef 5:25-27).

The same does not apply in other earthly institutions. Since they are merely human, the failures of their members may tarnish them. The Church is the only institution that has a divine dimension. Therefore, despite the faults of its human dimension, its substance always remains pure. She is holy, because her Founder is holy: she is the Immaculate Spouse of Christ. Only men within the Church are sinners; Holy Mother Church cannot sin.

“She is therefore holy,” Paul VI points out, “though she has sinners in her bosom, because she herself has no other life but that of grace: it is by living by her life that her members are sanctified; it is by removing themselves from her life that they fall into sins and disorders that prevent the radiation of her sanctity.” Therefore, this rule applies to any member of the Church, including those who belong to the clergy: they only err when their love for the Church diminishes and they slacken in their commitment to her.

“In this perspective,” says Cardinal Biffi, Archbishop Emeritus of Bologna, “it becomes clear that all of our faults — small or great — not only constitute an infidelity to the love that links us to the Father, belittling the redeeming work of Christ, and resisting the sanctifying action of the Holy Spirit, but they also outrage and inflict suffering upon the Church. Every contradiction with our baptism is always an ingratitude against she who brought us forth in baptism; it is an attack against her beauty as Spouse of the Lord; beauty that, in human eyes, becomes obscured through our reprehensible act. […] But we, at least, though we sin almost as they, are accustomed to daily asking for the pardon of our dear Mother for all that we have thought, said or done in a spirit that is not fully ‘ecclesial.’”

Sinners do not belong to the Church by reason of their sins, says Cardinal Journet, “but for that which still remains in them of gifts from God, by reason of sacramental character, faith, theological hope, their prayers, and their remorse. They are linked, so to speak, to the just. They are found in the Church provisionally, to be, one day, either definitively reintegrated or separated from her. They are in the Church, not in a salvific manner, but as paralyzed persons in respect to her more elevated and significant activities.”

Clearly, the Church “does not expel sinners from within her bosom, but only their sin; she continues to maintain them in the hope of being able to convert them. She fights within them against the sins they have committed.”

Emphasizing the sanctity of the Church which is not stained by the sins of her children, Cardinal Journet calls attention to her intimate relationship with each of the three Persons of the Blessed Trinity: from all eternity, the Catholic Church is known and loved by the Father. She is founded by His Son, who came to redeem us by the Cross. And she is vivified by the Holy Spirit, who came to establish His dwelling in her. “The entire Church thus appears as a people united, in the image of the oneness of the Father, Son and Spirit, de unitate Patris et Filii et Spiritus Sancti plebs adunata.”

The relationship of the Mother of God with the Holy Church is another factor of her sanctity. Knowledge of the true doctrine on Mary will always be a key to understanding the mystery of Christ and of the Church. The Sanctity of Our Lady is reflected in the Church; her virginity, her purity, her openness to the will of God. The angels and the blessed in heaven also preserve the Church in sanctity, ennobling her worship of God.

All of the works of the Church have the sanctification of men in Christ and the glorification of God as their goal. However, she could not realize this finality if she were not holy. Thus, even if, on this earth, she be governed by and composed of sinners, she is indefectibly holy, as is proven by the abundant fruits of sanctification that she has produced. One outstanding sign of this sanctity is the voluntary observance of the evangelical counsels, by which hundreds of thousands of men and women renounce everything that they could legitimately have in this life ― family, possessions, freedom to make their own decisions ― to totally imitate Jesus Christ.

The Church has the courage to demand that all of her children combat sin. Many souls say “yes” to this appeal; however, the good that they practice generally remains hidden. Evil receives much more publicity in this world, since its boldness grabs everyone’s attention. Be that as it may, men and women of extraordinary sanctity are never lacking to the Church, and as an instrument of sanctification, she undergoes a continual renewal.

It is, therefore, a grave error to propose modifications to the ecclesial structure. When “people start to question the value of the priestly commitment as a total entrustment to God through apostolic celibacy and as a total openness to the service of souls,” noted Benedict XVI during his trip to Brazil, “and preference is given to ideological, political and even party issues, the structure of total consecration to God begins to lose its deepest meaning. How can we not be deeply saddened by this?”

The full document may be found here:

http://www.arautos.org/desagravo/?lang=en


------------------------------------------------------------------

Msgr. João Scognamiglio Clá Dias, EP, is Honorary Canon of the Papal Basilica Saint Mary Major in Rome, Supernumerary Apostolic Protonotary, Doctor of Canon Law from the Angelicum, Master of Educational Psychology from the Catholic University of Columbia, Doctor Honoris Causa from the Italo-Brazilian University, Member of the Thomas Aquinas International Society (SITA) and of the Pontifical Academy of the Immaculata, Founder and Superior General of three entities of Pontifical Right: International Association of the Faithful, Heralds of the Gospel; Clerical Society of Apostolic Life, Virgo Flos Carmeli; and the Society of Apostolic Life, Regina Virginum.

The Church is Immaculate and Indefectible (Part III)

Bloody Savagery

In Antiquity, killing was viewed with indifference, as being a natural happening in the life of peoples. The massacre of a population of a city caused neither surprise nor indignation.
The proclivity for bloody sacrifices was linked to various rites of paganism. In Greece, the old religion considered it fitting to offer human holocausts in payment to the gods. These sacrifices, common among the Greeks of distant eras, later decreased, but did not completely disappear. In the second century of the Christian Era, human lives were still sacrificed in Arcadia, in honour of Lyceum Zeus.

In Rome, the spectacle most prized by the people was that of men dying, and the gladiator fights in Rome were occasions of pitiless slaughters. “In the morning, says Seneca, men are thrown to the lions and bears; after mid-day, they are thrown [at will] to the spectators. The end for all fighters had to be death, and they set themselves to work with iron and fire, until the arena was emptied.” In these “sessions” which began at mid-day, those condemned to death were compelled to mutually execute each other until the last one. Both this custom as well as that of feeding beasts with human flesh helps us “to understand the pleasure-seeking ferocity with which the Romans vented themselves in anti-Christian persecutions,” observes Daniel-Rops, and concludes: “As revolting as we find these scenes, in which Christians would also be victims, they were normal in Rome. And rare, very rare, were spectators who manifested their disapproval.”

Panem et circenses became known as the ideal formula to appease the multitude and also feed its growing thirst for blood. It was, equally, one of the causes of its deterioration.

The scourge of paedophilia

What is denominated by today’s press as paedophilia was largely practiced in the ancient world, under the protection of law, through the influence of the pagan religions.
In Greece, the sexual corruption of boys, more precisely called pederasty, was carried out as a legalized practice. Every adult male who was not a slave, had the right to practice it. Such was the custom in Persia and in other places, where it was maintained for centuries. Rome also became contaminated by the Grecian evil, to the point that many emperors procured male adolescents as lovers.

Boys who were considered comely, if they had been made prisoners of war or who had been abducted or sold by their parents, were mutilated for the purpose of feeding the trafficking of eunuchs. Not even sons of the nobility escaped.

In Greece — especially Athens — the victims of pederasty were not only prisoners of war, the abducted, or slaves. Any boy could become the target of the infamous desires of adult men, and the custom was to yield. If a father, endowed with a remnant of moral sensibility, desired to spare his sons this tragedy, he had to act before it happened, employing slaves, who would watch over the son like hawks. But, says Aeschylus, many parents desired to have beautiful sons, even though they knew that this would make them the target of predators.

The schools — the highly acclaimed Academies — were places where students, from the age of 12 or even younger, became the prey of the masters. The Athenian laws went so far as to protect and encourage this practice, even regulating flirtation and “love-making” between men and boys.

Greeks such as Solon, Aeschylus, Sophocles, Xenophon, Thucydides, Aeschines and Aristophanes, famous in the world of literature, the arts, philosophy and politics, practiced and extolled pederasty.

Greek philosophy reached the point of debating this infamous practice, without ever completely condemning it. Even Socrates, Plato, and Aristotle were not exempt from this evil. In Charmides, Plato refers to an adolescent of this name, as a lover praising his beloved, speaking of his attractiveness and of the emotions that he produced. In the Symposium, the character Phaedrus waxes lyrical in describing a happy and successful army, entirely composed of men-lovers and boy-beloveds. Nevertheless, finally attracted by more elevated ideas, Plato progressed from his conditional approval of pederasty in his early dialogues, to the formal condemnation of this vice in his last work, The Laws. In the meantime, his attempts, like those of some stoics, to propose a “chaste” pederasty were received with sarcasm by the people, and remained without result. In effect, “platonic love” is very difficult to practice, since with regard to chastity, man is not able to remain permanently on the middle term.

The Greeks stooped to consider the natural relationship between man and woman as inferior to the relationship between man and boy. In a society in which this type of conduct influenced even the ideal of the State, the woman would have been despised, relegated to the role of mere reproducer.

A historical-philosophical work such as Erotes, from the second or third century A.D, attributed by many to Lucian of Samosata presents a dialogue between two Greeks who seriously discuss which type of love is superior…Similarly, Lucian approaches this theme in the tenth Dialogue of the Courtesans. Plutarch, in Erotikus, with all seriousness analyses which attraction — for woman or for boys — is most interesting for an adult man. Fortunately, contrary to Erotes, he concludes that the ideal is truly monogamous marriage.

In Rome, girls could also be the victims of sexual violence. This can be gathered from the words of Saint Justin, in his Apologetics, where he vituperates the custom of rejected children — boys and girls — being made slaves for prostitution: “And as the ancients are said to have reared herds of oxen, or goats, or sheep, or grazing horses, so now we see you rear children only for this shameful use; and for this pollution a multitude of females and hermaphrodites, and those who commit unmentionable iniquities, are found in every nation. [...] And there are some who prostitute even their own children and wives, and some are openly mutilated for the purpose of sodomy.”
*
This is the world, without the presence of the holy Church of God. The picture presented here, although incomplete, is sufficiently tragic to expose the maladies of pagan Antiquity and give us a notion of the shock that ensued at the time in which the message of the Gospel began to hold up opposed, well-ordered and holy values.

The shock of Gospel values with worldly counter-values

The message of Jesus Christ threw the worm-eaten ancient world off balance. It censured libertinism and cruelty, and upheld the freedom to practice the good, chastity, virginity, innocence, conjugal fidelity, love of enemies, charity, abnegation, goodness toward the weak, and dignity for all human beings, created in the image and likeness of God.

A particular horror of the sin of paedophilia was instilled in souls by our Divine Master, with words of extreme severity: “If any of you put a stumbling block before one of these little ones who believe in me, it would be better for you if a great millstone were fastened around your neck and you were drowned in the depths of the sea” (Mt 18:6).

Paganism could not remain indifferent in face of the sublimity of the Gospel. Only two reactions remained to it: that of becoming enchanted by and submitting to the gentle yoke of God, or of hating and persecuting. Not a few converted. Many, however, remained stuck in the mire, and in their hatred, brought many millions of Christians to martyrdom.

Nevertheless, the blood of the martyrs began to be the seed of new Christians, according to the celebrated affirmation of Tertullian. The spectacle of men and women, the elderly, adults in the prime of life, vigorous youths, virgins, children — all confessing faith in Jesus Christ and stepping resolutely toward death — drew admiration from many spectators, resulting in an ever-growing number of conversions.

Paganism needed, then, to make use of another weapon to try to reverse the situation: defamation and calumny. As the Christian apologists of those first centuries observe, the pagans began accusing the Christians of the very wrongs committed by paganism.

It is noteworthy that one of the accusations was that of paedophilia aggravated by incest. Saint Justin comments: “The things which you do openly and with applause, […] these you lay to our charge.” And Arnobius upbraids the pagans: “How shameful, how bold it is to censure, in another, that which the accuser himself practices — taking advantage of the occasion to insult and accuse others of things that can be turned back against himself!”

This is to say that those pagans acted like thieves who, in the act of stealing, cry out, “stop thief!” (To be continued ...)

The full document may be found here:

http://www.arautos.org/desagravo/?lang=en

------------------------------------------------------------------

Msgr. João Scognamiglio Clá Dias, EP, is Honorary Canon of the Papal Basilica Saint Mary Major in Rome, Supernumerary Apostolic Protonotary, Doctor of Canon Law from the Angelicum, Master of Educational Psychology from the Catholic University of Columbia, Doctor Honoris Causa from the Italo-Brazilian University, Member of the Thomas Aquinas International Society (SITA) and of the Pontifical Academy of the Immaculata, Founder and Superior General of three entities of Pontifical Right: International Association of the Faithful, Heralds of the Gospel; Clerical Society of Apostolic Life, Virgo Flos Carmeli; and the Society of Apostolic Life, Regina Virginum.

The Church is Immaculate and Indefectible (Part II)

Immorality, cruelty and oppression

In that pagan environment, the situation of women was appalling. In general they had almost no rights, and were practically considered slaves of their husbands, that is, when they had the privilege of being married.

The religions themselves, even the most elevated ones, led women — and naturally men as well — into great depravity. That of the Chaldeans, for example, was sinister and corrupt, featuring lubricous practices in the temples. The Phoenician religion also incited the degradation of women.

Herodotus is among those who furnish us with information on the “sacred prostitution” practiced in the temples of Babylonia, Assyria, Greece, Cyprus and in other places. The “priestesses” frequently entered the temple while still very young, given over by their own parents. The famous “Code of Hammurabi,” promulgated by this king of Babylonia (circa 1793 to 1750 B.C.), dedicates some passages to the regulation of this practice.

The cult of Cybele and Attis, which originated in Phrygia and spread to Greece and Rome, led to scabrous practices in public. Since Attis had mutilated himself, losing his masculinity, his celebrations included the auto-mutilation of many men carried out in the midst of a delirious multitude that danced and howled while deafening music was played on flutes, cymbals and drums.

Greece had numerous temples dedicated to Venus, but not one consecrated to legitimate love between spouses. Once a year, Athens and other cities held an event in which an enormous phallic sculpture was borne in procession. Men and women went through the streets, singing, leaping and dancing around this idol.

Oppression of women

Feminine honour was being damaged by the custom of polygamy which was generalized in many regions, while, in other places, polyandry was in force. Equally degrading was incest, especially common in Persia, but also in Greece.

In India, among the cruel pagan practices spanning millennia, custom demanded that the widow be burned alongside the body of her husband.

The Code of Hammurabi is replete with norms that reflect the state of the oppression of women in ancient civilizations; women were often punished with death, slavery or repudiation.
Even in Rome and Greece, ancient laws with regard to woman were inequitable, and even persons such as the austere Cato favoured grave injustices in this respect. In Athens, to prevent partiality toward daughters in questions of inheritance, the law fell into an even greater aberration in encouraging incest to resolve such problems, even demanding the destruction of two already constituted homes, if need be.

In Rome, during the era in which the Good News of Jesus Christ was being preached, the institution of the family found itself in a grave crisis. Abortion and child abandonment reached shocking proportions. The birth-rate decreased. Wealthy men preferred to remain single and surround themselves with innumerable slave women rather than subject themselves to the inconveniences of marriage.

The situation of children before the all-powerful state

There was no individual liberty in Greece and in Rome as their admirers would have us believe: the citizen lived in virtue of the State. In his Republic, Plato himself professed an all-powerful State, and even Aristotle considered it the supreme ideal.

The Greco-Roman family was also totalitarian from certain perspectives. Thus, Roman law gave a dictatorial power to the pater familias. In Greece, similar laws were in vigour. The father had the right to reject his newborn son, or to sell him as a slave. He could also condemn his wife, son, daughter, or any other dweller in his house to death — the sentence being executed without delay; the State authorities did not interfere.

In Sparta, comments Coulanges, “the State had the right not to tolerate that its citizens be deformed or ill-constituted. It therefore ordered the father to whom such a child was born, to make it die.” According to the same author, this law was equally found in the ancient codes of Rome and even Aristotle and Plato included this practice in their legislative proposals.
In Carthage and Phoenicia, children were offered in sacrifice to the idols; in Rome and Greece they were used in divination rites. In various places, children and adolescents could be punished with death for a misdeed committed by the father.

At the same time that the State gave the father unlimited power at home, it tyrannically controlled him in the education of his sons. Among the Greeks, the State was the absolute master of education, and Plato justifies this, since “the parents should not be free to send or not send their sons to masters that the city chooses, because children belong less to their parents than to the city.” The State considered that the body and soul of each citizen belonged to it, and assumed the child when it had completed seven years of age.

Pitiless and widespread slavery

Slavery was such an accepted institution in the ancient world that slaves commonly made up the majority of the population. In Rome, in the time of Augustus, more than a third of the population was constituted of slaves.

The owner of a slave had over total rights over him. A slave was not, properly speaking, a man; he was a thing, res mancipi. The owner not only had the right to cohabitate with the wife of his slave without committing adultery, but also to do as he wished with his children, and if he wounded or killed them he committed no wrong.

In Roman law there were clauses concerning slaves that sparked great cruelties. In the time of Nero, for example, a high-standing magistrate was assassinated by one of his slaves. “The Senator, after long discussion, decided to apply the old law to all the servants of the house, which condemned, to the torture of the cross, all of the slaves who had not had the shrewdness to protect their master. There were such popular protests at this terrible sentence that the 400 condemned had to be executed under army guard.”
slavery,
There have always been one or another slave-owner who treated his slaves humanely or ― more rarely ― with respect, but it would be naive to think that this was the typical attitude.
(To be continued …. )

The full document may be found here:

http://www.arautos.org/desagravo/?lang=en

-----------------------------------------------------------------------------
Msgr. João Scognamiglio Clá Dias, EP, is Honorary Canon of the Papal Basilica Saint Mary Major in Rome, Supernumerary Apostolic Protonotary, Doctor of Canon Law from the Angelicum, Master of Educational Psychology from the Catholic University of Columbia, Doctor Honoris Causa from the Italo-Brazilian University, Member of the Thomas Aquinas International Society (SITA) and of the Pontifical Academy of the Immaculata, Founder and Superior General of three entities of Pontifical Right: International Association of the Faithful, Heralds of the Gospel; Clerical Society of Apostolic Life, Virgo Flos Carmeli; and the Society of Apostolic Life, Regina Virginum.

Feast of the Holy Martyr, St. George

Today we celebrate the Patron Saint of England, Saint George, "The Great Martyr" whose life has come to symbolize the victory of good over evil.

Prayer to St George.

This Prayer to Saint George refers to the courage it took for the saint to confess his Christianity before opposing authority:

Almighty God, who gave to your servant George boldness to Confess the Name of our Savior Jesus Christ before the rulers of this world, and courage to die for this faith: Grant that we may always be ready to give a reason for the hope that is in us, and to suffer gladly for the sake of our Lord Jesus Christ; who lives and reigns with you and the Holy Spirit, one God, for ever and ever.

St. George, Heroic Catholic soldier and defender of your Faith, you dared to criticize a tyrannical Emperor and were subjected to horrible torture. You could have occupied a high military position but you preferred to die for your Lord. Obtain for us the great grace of heroic Christian courage that should mark soldiers of Christ. Amen

O GOD, who didst grant to Saint George strength and constancy in the various torments which he sustained for our holy faith; we beseech Thee to preserve, through his intercession, our faith from wavering and doubt, so that we may serve Thee with a sincere heart faithfully unto death. Through Christ our Lord. Amen.



Happy St George's Day to all readers of our Blog. May we take the opportunity on this, his Feast Day, to ask for the same grace of courage and endurance that that he showed in his life and terrible martyrdom.