We, as a Country and as a people of God, have to get back to a morality that is base on what God has told us is the difference between right and wrong...

This past week I heard a very powerful message from a holy priest who was speaking about the horrible massacre which took place at the movie theater in Aurora Colorado; this priest’s name by the way is Father Mitch Pacwa. I know that many of you know of Him. I want to share this very important message with you today.

We are very shocked and concerned about this terrible tragedy and our hearts continue to go out to the families of the victims; and we continue to pray for those who were killed and injured. We also pray for all of the law enforcement and EMS personal who had to be greatly affected by such unspeakable horror.

I am sure we are going to hear plenty of people tell us what we need to do to prevent such a tragedy from occurring in the future. But I think, as did this good and holy priest that I listen too, that we have to keep something very important in mind as we struggle to come to grasp with such evil and seek a remedy for our society. I think we have to keep something very important in mind that has to do with the nature of our great country.

When the Constitution of these Unites States was written, the founding Fathers said they wanted to restrict the size and power of the federal Government. Remember when they came to America, they had just escaped from an oppressive government and so definitely did not want to form a new oppressive Government. So they focused on restricting the federal government and limiting its power and its reach.

But when you read some of the document of these first founders, especially Washington, Jefferson, Franklin, Adams and others, they emphasized that with such a government structure, which placed so much on individual responsibility, you depend on having a moral people, that the people themselves have to have firm moral characters. In other words, they knew that their vision would only work with a nation of Godly people. And so these same founders emphasized that this character would habve to be fashioned by faith in the true God and His Ten Commandments and Teaching, that it would have to be fashioned by their Religion. This is exactly why the founding Fathers knew the importance and necessity of religious freedom and so emphasized it in our founding documents. Without religious freedom the America experience dies from immorality.

When you look at all of history we discover, shockingly, that the last century has witnessed some of the most horrible mass murders ever seen. In fact, before 1890 we would be hard pressed to find such atrocities as we just witnessed in Colorado. Even though these unspeakable crimes begin around 1890, we see them begin in earnest in the early part of the century; but where you really see them increase is from 1965 forward.

From 1965 on we can count about 60 or so serial killers and mass murders; who interestingly, use for the most part small caliber weapons in perpetrating their killing. Colorado was rare in its use of a large caliber weapon.

What’s interesting, and I think this points to the real problem at hand, it is interesting that about this time (1965 and on) we can see the beginning of a strong diabolical movement to get God and the truths of the Christian religion out of the public sphere, out of the public discussion, attempting to keep God away from this aspect of public life. We also see at this same time many corresponding societal revolutions shaking the foundation of our Judeo-Christian culture, shaking the foundations of Western Civilization--the sexual revolution, the drug revolution and a religious revolution esepcially within the Church herself, this religious revolution as seen by a rejection of the Encyclical Human Vitae--Human Life, as well as by the great exodus of priests and religious and the subsequent freefall in the attendance of Catholics at Holy Mass.

And so in most of these mass murders, not in all but by far in most, the constant underlying theme has included something twisted on the sexual side and, drug use. And most especially, you see a hatred for God and the sacred things of God, including and especially a hatred for His true Church on earth, the Holy Roman Catholic Church. It is as if when God is kicked out of society a vacuum results which then becomes filled in by pure evil.

And so, all of us as faithful Catholic Christians, as faithful Americans have to raise up, doing more of what we can to in righteousness to confront the people and organizations in our country that are trying to remove God from the public discourse.
It is time for us to ever more start standing up to the forces of the media, some in the judicial system, and in organizations such ACLU, who are doing everything they can to squash religious freedom in order to keep God out and to keep Christians, especially Catholic Christians, out of public life and so silence the moral voice of the Catholic Church which is the audible voice of Jesus Christ Himself, the True and Living God incarnate.

And all Americans, beginning with us Catholic Christians have to, with God’s grace, repent more deeply in order to get back to ever more fully living a deeper moral life that is rooted in what God has taught us, rooted in the truth that comes from God and is proclaimed infallible by His Catholic Church and her teachings, all her teachings including those which are deemed unrealistic in today’s so-called enlightened modern age. For to live this moral life is to live our life fully because we are living it in Christ, through Christ—living life with Christ.

We, as a Country and as a people of God, have to get back to a morality that is base on what God has told us is the difference between right and wrong even when it is not politically or socially acceptable or even tolerated, even when it is politically incorrect. And even we are mocked and called names or accused of being judgmental, we have to stand up for what is right and stand against what is wrong. We as Catholic Americans are called by Jesus Himself to, in love for our all of our brethren, speak up and teach the truth about what is right and what is wrong, to teach the full unadulterated Gospel; and to do so, most especially, by how we live our lives. We have to proclaim with our voices but most especially by our actions that right is right if no one is doing it and wrong is wrong even if every one is doing it.

And in confronting our current culture of death, we have to especially proclaim the Gospel of LIFE!!! Because what is universal in every single case of mass murder, serial murder and massacre is that none of the perpetrators have any sense of the dignity of other people; they have no concern for them being real persons. They treat their victims merely as objects; they have no concern whatever for human life. They are literally a product of our society that is doing the very same thing with it’s culture of death; a society which tears apart and discards the unborn as if they were non-person, as if they werer merly a blop of matter; a society which kills the sick and elderly under the premise of so-called “mercy, or insufficient quality of life; and a society which rejects the sanctity of life by experimenting on it without any regard for Lord and Giver of Life; they are a product of a society which seeks to redefine that which God has defined to bring forth new human life into the world and nurture it, namely, marriage between one man and one women, the family itself.

And so we, you and I, all of us have a grave responsibility to teach that it is God who gives us our dignity as people. We have to proclaim without fear, that is God the Creator who give us our dignity as human persons as our own declaration of Independence makes clear, and that our inalienable rights come directly from the Creator to each individual, no exceptions, from the moment of conception to natural death.

With all due respect, I know our president will talk about our inalienable rights but notice he refuses to talk about them as coming directly from the Creator; he refuses to acknowledge this truth, this reality; he always skips the part about the Creator when he quotes or mentions this part of the Declaration of Independence. But you can’t skip this truth; it is the Creator Who is the source of these rights, not the government, not any government and not any man or group of men.

Brothers and sisters in Christ, we have to be the ones to remind everyone, including our elected officials, that God is the source of human dignity and rights, and that each human person must be seen as an individual endowed with these rights from God. And in light of this perennial truth, as the declaration also says, everyone of us will be answerable to God Himself for what we do or what we fail to do. This is also in the Declaration. A lot of people don’t pay attention to that part; but in the last paragraph it is there...that everyone is responsible before God for protecting the dignity and rights of the human person, especially the right to life and religious freedom. We have to remind people of this, we have to call people to that accountability to God, not to an accountability to the government, not to a priest, but to God our Lord the Almighty Creator and sustainer of heaven and earth.

One last point, this holy and wise priest made. In watching the news over the last few days what was impressive was the number of heroes…the number of people who gave their lives to protect others, men literally laid themselves on top of their girlfriends in order to be human body shields taking the bullets, giving their lives so another could live. These people are heroes; and they are heroes because they did see the dignity of life, did see the dignity of the human person, so much so that they gave their life to protect this dignity which comes from the Creator, who is the Lord of Life. That’s why we celebrate them as heroes, "for no greater love is there than this than that a man would lay down His life for his friend."

There were other heroes as well, those who praying for those who were injured, those who although injured themself still tried to come to the aid of others who were injured, those who even though bleeding themselves prayed for others; and all those other heroes who put them self in harms way, in grave and mortal danger in order to come to the aid of others…God has send us and our county a powerful message by the selfless actions of these heroes and we celebrate them.

Father Pacwa ending his powerful message by saying that in light of all this incredible heroism of so many to protect life, because of its dignity and worth which comes from the Creator, we should pray that we all can be heroes, like these heroes, in our society and call people to respect the God given dignity every human person, born or unborn, innocent or guilty, male or female, black or white, conscious or unconscious, rich or poor. And if it be God’s will to have the courage to sacrifice all we have, even our lives in order to save life, especially eternal life, the eternal life of souls.

It’s up to us, you and me, to do whatever we can with the help of God’s grace in order to convert our current culture of death into a culture of LIFE. We are all so weak and fearful; but let us not fear, our strength is in the LORD! He loves us so much. Let us fall on our knees in faith and love before out God Truly Present in the Holy Eucharist and cry out, “Jesus I trust in Thee! Jesus I trust in Thee! Jesus I trust in Thee! Have mercy on us and on our whole world, have mercy on our beloved country, the United States of America, convert her for in God, in You, we TRUST! O my Jesus forgive us our sins, save us from the fires of hell, lead all souls to heaven, especially those who are in most need of Thy Mercy. Our Lady of the Immaculate Conception, patroness of our Country pray for us, obtain the grace we need to faithful even to the foot of the cross. Amen.