How many world religions have as one of their most central images a tender scene of a mother and child? I only know of one: Catholicism. It is a sign that Catholicism is a faith that occurs where we most intensely live, and where we are vulnerable, and values tenderness. The universal image of mother and child is something all people may relate to. Any person of good will can see this icon and feel joy and warmth.
It is also an image the enemies of God hate: specifically, those in the demonic realm and those under their influence on earth. I once saw something that made my blood run cold. I was standing in a cashier line at the Boston College Bookstore. In the next line was a mother with a baby over her shoulder as she fumbled with her wallet. I smiled and mugged at the baby looking for a smile. Then I noticed the woman standing behind them in line. I glanced at her expecting to see the woman smiling at the baby. What I saw instead shocked me. It is hard to describe the hard look on the woman’s face as she looked at the baby but it was something akin to disdain.
Boston College, that Jesuit institution, was infested with radical feminists at the time, with many angry feminists on the faculty. The experience shook me but didn’t surprise me.
We used to have hyperbolic expressions such as “That’s like being against motherhood and apple pie!” But there are people, militant people, violently disturbed by motherhood. People are also hostile to Christianity and Catholicism in particular, because of the Church’s unyielding opposition to abortion and homosexual activity. Those who promote and practice these activities behave and speak as though the opposition was against them personally instead of against behaviors. Apparently they cannot distinguish between themselves and their behavior. Their identities have come to rest on their behavior rather than who they are as human beings.
The Catholic League for Religious and Civil Rights issued a statement December 22 detailing eleven incidents of vandalism occurring against nativity scenes nationwide. Here are just two of them:
- In Sandusky, Ohio, a 50-year old figure of the Baby Jesus was stolen from a downtown park; it was found a few days later hanging from a ceiling fan in the apartment of the thief who stole it.
- A Christian pastor in Loma Linda, California was beaten and left in critical condition while decorating his church.
As usual, for radicals “tolerance” is a one-way street.
Most vandalism is mischief but the increase we have been seeing, not limited to demolishing nativity scenes and beating up an innocent pastor decorating his church, points to something much more disturbing: the desecration and destruction of the Sacred Host. I have a Google alert set up for this and reports arrive every day. This, I believe, takes us into the realm of the demonic. We all commit evil. It’s called sin. By grace we feel the disturbance in our conscience and repent. This is Christianity: we need a savior and know it.
But when one smothers conscience and chooses to worship the creature rather than the Creator (see Romans 1: 18-32), and persists — nay works — at evil, we have moved from evil to wickedness. Wickedness wants the evil. Our society today has the media and politicians pandering to wickedness; they have traded the virtue of Fear of the Lord to fear of offending radicals via the evil of “Political Correctness.”
Wickedness, which cannot harm God, seeks to destroy what God loves. We see this from the satanic mutilation of innocent animals right on up to the destruction of innocent children in the womb. This evil — abortion — is the hub, the lynchpin, unleashing diabolical rage. A simple scene of a mother and child can set off monstrous rage, hatred and confusion. The mentality of Antinatalism is enraged by the Nativity. This hatred of creation, and life itself — much less its redemption — has been unleashed, and those who have allowed the principalities and powers of wickedness into their souls are getting bolder. The death addicts are even turning on their political “messiah,” Barak Obama, for inviting a popular evangelical to pray the invocation at his inauguration.
Pray a lot. It’s going to be an interesting four years.