"It is...Our will that Catholics should abstain from certain appellations which have recently been brought into use to distinguish one group of Catholics from another. They are to be avoided not only as 'profane novelties of words,' out of harmony with both truth and justice, but also because they give rise to great trouble and confusion among Catholics. Such is the nature of Catholicism that it does not admit of more or less, but must be held as a whole or as a whole rejected: 'This is the Catholic faith, which unless a man believe faithfully and firmly; he cannot be saved' (Athanasian Creed). There is no need of adding any qualifying terms to the profession of Catholicism: it is quite enough for each one to proclaim 'Christian is my name and Catholic my surname,' only let him endeavour to be in reality what he calls himself." -- Pope Benedict XV, Ad Beatissimi Apostolorum 24 (1914)

Sunday, March 30, 2014

A Catholic Band of Brothers

Regina Magazine


March 10, 2014

“You must put on the armor of God if you are to resist on the evil day”
 by Donna Sue Berry
Fr Richard Heilman and his Knights of Divine Mercy help young Catholic men ‘put on the armor of God’ for themselves and their families. In this exclusive interview, he tells Regina Magazine  about how a strip club invading a small Midwestern town made it all happen.
What prompted you to begin the Knights of Divine Mercy?
In 2005, I was assigned as pastor of two parishes, one of which was St. Mary’s of Pine Bluff, a Catholic parish in a small, unincorporated town near Madison, Wisconsin. The little town of Pine Bluff has one church, two bars, and a handful of homes. Fields and idyllic countryside surround it. It’s the kind of town where people dream of raising their kids.
Shortly after my arrival, one of the bar owners decided to rent out his cozy establishment to a strip club owner. Neighbors were appalled, and the little town was stunned. But there was not, it seemed, much that anyone could do.
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Twelfth Station of the Cross in Pine Bluff’s parish cemetery, where protesters tied their white ribbons to the 100 year old kneeler.
That’s terrible! How did you get involved? 
Discerning God’s will, I organized a mile-long Stations of the Cross through the town. I invited everyone to pray along this “miracle mile,” in an effort to reclaim this surrendered ground and to consecrate the soil back to Our Lord.
The inaugural prayer walk was on Palm Sunday 2005. Over two hundred people spilled into the little town of Pine Bluff to participate in the miracle mile. We prepared for the prayer walk by placing two-foot-high crosses in the lawns stretching all the way down the main road and back, the length of the miracle mile. Participants carried their prayer sheets and a white ribbon (a symbol of purity and anti-pornography).
The twelfth station found them at the entrance to the beautiful parish cemetery on a bluff with a life-size crucifix of our Lord and a one-hundred-year-old stone kneeler in front. The participants tied their white ribbons to this kneeler as a prayer form, much like lighting a vigil candle.
What happened after that day?
After that first prayer walk, a container holding prayer sheets and ribbons was placed at the first station on the walk. All were invited to come, pick up a prayer sheet and white ribbon, and pray at anytime of the day or night, as they wished. Over the next six months, prayer warriors walked the path, prayed the Stations, and sang hymns nearly round the clock. It was estimated that 600-700 ribbons were tied onto the cemetery kneeler over that period of time.
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Put on the armor of God so that you may be able to stand firm against the tactics of the devil. Our battle is not against human forces but against the principalities and powers, the rulers of this world of darkness, the evil spirits in regions above.”
So were you successful?
The miracle mile was, indeed, miraculous. Even though many say that the porn industry is more protected (under First Amendment rights) than are the babies in their mothers’ wombs, within six months the strip club was chased out of town. Little Pine Bluff was overjoyed, and a victory was won for Our Lord.
How did this inspire you?
Seeing that the power of prayer moved a very significant mountain, a seed was planted and a lion was awakened. Recall that this year of 2005 was also the year our mercy pope, John Paul the Great, went to be with his merciful Savior, as he passed on the very eve of Divine Mercy Sunday. Pope John Paul II’s love for the Divine Mercy devotion and the inspiration of this faithful remnant in Pine Bluff, who believed and saw their prayers answered, led me to found the Knights of Divine Mercy, an organization calling Catholic men to heroic virtue, to be strong husbands and fathers, and to be powerful men of prayer.
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Father Heilman says he was inspired by “this faithful remnant in Pine Bluff, who believed and saw their prayers answered” to found the Knights of Divine Mercy.
How did you begin?
Our first leadership meeting for the Knights of Divine Mercy was at a round table (Get it? Knights of the Roundtable?), and was held on the very spot the strippers danced in the “former” strip club. We began the meeting by breaking out Holy Water, Blessed Salt, and the prayers of the Church, as we blessed that place and, quite literally “reclaimed surrendered ground.”
What is the Knights of Divine Mercy?
The Knights of Divine Mercy apostolate seeks to awaken in men the eager desire for a knight’s true calling: The quest for heroic virtue, to be strong husbands and fathers, and to be powerful men of prayer. Men gather once a month for prayer, inspired teaching and a chance to become a “band of brothers” together pursuing virtue, holiness and chivalry.
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A KNIGHT’S TRUE CALLING: The quest for heroic virtue, to be strong husbands and fathers, and to be powerful men of prayer.
Were you inspired by Scripture?
The scripture passage that stands as the very foundation of this apostolate is from Paul’s Letter to the Ephesians: “Draw your strength from the Lord and His mighty power. Put on the armor of God so that you may be able to stand firm against the tactics of the devil. Our battle is not against human forces but against the principalities and powers, the rulers of this world of darkness, the evil spirits in regions above. You must put on the armor of God if you are to resist on the evil day; do all that your duty requires, and hold your ground” (Eph 6:10-12).
What is the primary focus of the Knights of Divine Mercy?
We help men understand and embrace their call to “live supernaturally.” We are living in an intensely secular era. Spiritually speaking, the devil is doing all that he can to catch us isolated and unarmed on the battlefield — no spiritual armor, no spiritual weapons, and no comrades to fight alongside of us. In other words, the reason evil is promoted so effectively today is because we’re ignoring God’s offer of supernatural strength and power.
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CARDINAL BURKE WITH THE KNIGHTS “We are living in an intensely secular era. Spiritually speaking, the devil is doing all that he can to catch us isolated and unarmed on the battlefield — no spiritual armor, no spiritual weapons, and no comrades to fight alongside of us.”
What are your Knights’ evenings like?
We immerse these men in sacred beauty and awe-inspiring reverence. We want our men to appreciate it as a moment when Heaven and Earth meet; when they are better able to make a Divine connection with their almighty God.
6:00 PM    (optional) Exposition of the Blessed Sacrament, Sacrament of Penance 
7:00 PM    Divine Mercy Chaplet, Inspirational Talk, Benediction
8:00 PM    Social (usually man food – pizza, beer and soda)
How are Knights’ wives and girlfriends reacting?
I’ve noticed that, with some other men’s organizations, some ladies will object to the men “getting a night out.” These organizations are, primarily, social and/or focus entirely on Corporal Works of Mercy, and not on “forming” men. For some ladies, this does not seem like enough to warrant the men taking time away from the family.
However, the response from the ladies in regards to the Knights of Divine Mercy has been altogether different. In fact, virtually all of the ladies arebegging their men to attend these evenings, since it focuses on forming these men to be strong Catholic men of faith and virtue, and good husbands and dads.
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BISHOP MORLINO prays at the Knights’ dedication of Pine Bluffs’ Rosary Garden.
If a man wishes to approach his Parish Priest about beginning the Knights of Divine Mercy in their parish, what should he do?
The first thing I would recommend is to gather a group of men together and do some preliminary research into the feasibility of such an apostolate in their area. I’d like to stress that this apostolate is designed, generally, to be regional. In other words, its reach is usually beyond one parish. This helps marshal your efforts and makes it easier to find priests and speakers (usually priests). Of course, in more sparsely populated areas, this may not be possible.
Once you have a great group of highly motivated guys, you can approach the priest with the prospect of establishing an apostolate that looks to form Catholic men in heroic virtue and great husbands and dads. It’s hard to refuse that, right? You’ll want to have a nice presentation prepared before seeing him, so very few questions will remain unanswered. You’ll want to assure him that the men will assume the vast majority of the responsibilities, especially as so many priests are overwhelmed during this era of a priest shortage. The priest will, already, need to commit to this one evening a month as the presider of prayer.
Finally, we try to make ourselves very accessible to help these apostolates with any questions, suggestions, etc. as they look to this possibility for themselves. You may want to make contact with us before approaching the priest, just to be sure your ducks are in a row.
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These men have become incredibly motivated to explore their faith more deeply as they realize how crucial it is that they remain empowered by God in a state of grace. They are also celebrating all things Catholic, and are more and more drawn to reverence and a sense of the sacred.”
What would you like to say to the readers of Regina Magazine about the Knights of Divine Mercy?
I cannot begin to describe how fruitful the Knights of Divine Mercy has been. I have seen men choking back tears as they state, “Where has this been all my life?” They are inspired by God and by discovering what it really means to be a “Band of Brothers.”
These men have become incredibly motivated to explore their faith more deeply; as they realize how crucial it is that they remain empowered by God in a state of grace. They are also celebrating all things Catholic, and are more and more drawn to reverence and a sense of the sacred.
Together, we continue to discover amazing nuggets within the treasury of our Catholic faith. They are 100% faithful to the teachings of the Church. They are the ones who end up being on the front lines out in front of Planned Parenthood, and they are the first to sign up for hours of Adoration. I am hard-pressed to find one of these guys without a tie on Sunday, and their wives and children are among those most excited about the remarkable growth in virtue and holiness these men are experiencing. This apostolate for men’s faith formation is so very necessary for our times!
How has the Knights of Divine Mercy grown? 
There is only a handful, at this point, mostly because we have never ventured into any great marketing campaign to get the word out about Knights of Divine Mercy. It seems that, once people hear about it, they show great interest. There are some in Wisconsin, one in Wyoming, and one getting ready to be established in Rockford, Illinois. We’re hoping someone with marketing skills comes our way.
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“I have seen men choking back tears as they state, “Where has this been all my life?” They are inspired by God and by discovering what it really means to be a ‘Band of Brothers.’”
Fr. Richard Heilman, pastor at St. Mary’s in Pine Bluff, WI,  discusses his wonderful initiatives (including the Knights of Divine Mercy and the Combat Rosary), the amazing fruits of reverent, ad orientem worship (which include, among other things, a nearly 50% boost in parish finances within the space of a year!), and his work towards helping to restore authentic masculinity among men today. 

New Religion Podcasts with Forward Boldly on BlogTalkRadio

Saturday, March 22, 2014

German Catholic Church, Inc.

Regina Magazine

February 26, 2014

By Harry Stevens

“It is the glory of vain men never to yield to truth. Such vainglory is a deadly passion for those it dominates. It is a disease that, in spite of every effort, is never cured–not because the doctor is inept, but because the patient is incurable.”

‘City of God’ by Saint Augustine of Hippo


In Germany, Catholics are leaving the Church in droves, as an average of 140,000 formally abandon the Faith annually.* This is easy to track, because numbers are publicly reported in a system where Germans pay 8-9% of their income tax to receive the Sacraments. The church tax is administered by the State on behalf of the Church through a payroll deduction, for a lucrative 2-3% processing fee.

And there is no tax relief. This was clarified at the highest levels when a Catholic canonist asked for relief of his Church tax in 2007. In response, the German bishops’ conference issued a decree stating that those who have declared to a government registry office that they are no longer members of the Catholic Church will no longer be able to actively participate in Church life nor receive the Sacraments. Period.

Why are Germans abandoning the Faith? The proximate causes range from well-publicized sex abuse scandals (touched off at a prominent Jesuit boys’ high school in Berlin) to a simple lack of faith. Largely un-catechized and uninterested, German Catholics would rather save the money, it seems.

But that’s not all there is to the story. Closer inspection reveals a German Church which is extremely wealthy and completely unregulated. Digging a little deeper reveals some questionable activities, mostly having to do with profiting from pornography and abortion.


Follow the Euros

Money is pivotal to this discussion. In 2013, the German Catholic Church collected a whopping 5.2 billion euro in church tax, in addition to 100-200 million euros per year in State subsidies from a still-valid 1803 agreement. Other income was derived from multiple sources, including Church ownership of no less than ten banks, several breweries, a mineral water company, and multiple insurance companies.

Unlike the beleaguered German taxpayer, the Church does not pay tax on Church property. Nor does it pay corporate or capital gains taxes. Everything it does as a public corporation in Germany is considered charitable and tax-exempt and guaranteed by the German constitution.

Also, unlike other public corporations like universities, the Church is not subject to any state supervision of its finances.

As for German bishops, “Most Americans would be a bit shocked to learn that German bishops make between €8000 ($10,965) and €11,500 ($15,763) a month, depending upon their seniority. That comes to between $131,000 and $189,000 a year…. In short, the German clergy may have a real financial interest in keeping the flock happy so they continue to pay that tax and not drop out.”*****


Catholic Church, Inc.


This all means a tremendous amount of money in the German bishops’ hands. The Catholic Church and the Lutheran Church combined are the second largest employers in Germany, with the Catholic Church employing 650,000 people, plus another 600,000 volunteers. In 2011 (the latest date available) the Church spent 129 million Euro in its dioceses.

The Catholic Church provides many social services for the elderly, infirm, and youth through organizations such as Caritas (‘Catholic Charities’ in the USA). Through these channels, the bishops’ influence reaches far and wide within the German Catholic community of 24 million. (Though only a tiny fraction — 2.8 million — actually attend weekly Mass.)


The Publishing Business

While it might seem that the German Church has more than enough revenue, apparently this has not been the case. Weltbild was the second largest bookselling company in Germany in 2011, with annual sales of $2.1 billion. Until that year, it was 100% owned by the German bishops’ conference.

In addition to a lucrative pornographic book publishing company that carried some 2,500 titles, Weltbild also sold books promoting satanism, the occult, esotericism, and anti-Christian atheist propaganda.

After years of public complaints, articles in Der Spiegel and a rebuke from Pope Benedict,** the German bishops’ conference finally announced that they had sold the company. Many believed the bishops’ shares were liquidated in 2011.

As of November 2013, however, it was still being reported that the Diocese of Augsburg, and the Archdioceses of Munich and Freiberg still owned parts of Weltbild. On January 19, 2014, parts of the company filed for insolvency.***


Profiting from Abortion

After German reunification in 1989, new laws came into effect stating that abortion would be legal within the first twelve weeks of pregnancy, but only after the woman received counseling on her decision.

Naturally, counseling would be well-compensated, paid for by the German State. The Catholic Bishops promptly organized a counseling service, which for a decade received state moneys for issuing certificates which permitted women to have abortions.

On January 26, 1998 Pope John Paul II asked the German bishops to withdraw from this lucrative side business. Cardinal Ratzinger, as prefect of the Congregation for the Faith, was given the task of carrying out the Pope’s instructions.

More than a year later, the German bishops finally responded, unanimously rejecting the Pope’s demand. On November 20, 1999, JPII specifically instructed the German bishops in a letter that in the future pregnant women should no longer be issued any certificates by the counseling service of the German Bishops.

It wasn’t until March 8, 2002 – four years later — that the German bishops finally removed themselves from this counseling business in all dioceses. ****


The Root of All Evil

Reviewing these facts, it is easy to conclude that the Bible is correct; the love of money may well be the root of all evil. Bearing this in mind, perhaps there is a bit more to the steady exodus of German Catholics from the Church than what the German media reports.

For, in addition to the fact that Catholics are getting very little for their money, there are very serious ethical questions indeed about how it is being used by the German Church.


*All statistics from the official website of the German Bishops’ Conference, which has reported Catholics leaving as follows: 2010 (181,193); 2011 (126,48 ) and 2012 (118,3350). The website can be found here: in German (all years) in English (2010)

**http://www.lifesitenews.com/news/after-papal-rebuke-german-bishops-to-sell-book-company-caught-selling-eroti/

***http://eponymousflower.blogspot.de/2013/11/60-million-euro-church-tax-for-porno.html

****Article by Stephan Köhnlein at Cathcon: http://bit.ly/1poIiCQ


*****http://www.thecatholicthing.org/columns/2014/germanys-pay-to-pray-regime.html

More sources:

http://www.crisismagazine.com/2013/is-schism-inevitable-in-germany

http://www.lifesitenews.com/news/german-bishops-finally-denounce-abortion-counselling-service

http://www.priestsforlife.org/magisterium/98-01-11germancounseling.html

Saturday, March 15, 2014

OECTA and the further destruction of Catholic education

Catholic Insight

Published: Friday, March 14, 2014, 5:00 am | Author: Terry McDermott 

In a move that can only elicit shock and anger in faithful Catholics, the Ontario English Catholic Teachers Association (OECTA) has announced they will march in the WorldPride Parade in Toronto this year after a motion was passed at OECTA’s recent annual general meeting. A rationale attached to the motion reads: “Registering for, and marching in the WorldPride Parade is a visible symbol of solidarity with one of the most marginalized groups in the Catholic community.” Thank you to LifeSiteNews for bringing this scandal to our attention.

This move is a blatant assault on the Catholic Church from the very people who are supposed to be teaching our children about the Faith. In truth, no one should be surprised at this development because our Catholic schools are not really Catholic at all.

This latest development continues the meteoric destruction of publicly-funded Catholic schools in Ontario. The seed of this latest affront can be traced back to the introduction of the religious textbooks currently used in Catholic primary and secondary schools. The Born in the Spirit textbooks used in primary schools are woefully negligent in teaching the fundamentals of the Catholic Faith. The Fully Alive family life program, a euphemism for sex education class, does not teach modesty and chastity but contributes to the desensitization of our children in sexual matters. The textbooks used in high school are no better. In grade eleven, our children learn about world religions when they don’t even know about their own. In the primary and secondary grades, most teachers teach their personal interpretation of the Faith instead of faithfully teaching the Magisterial teachings of the Catholic Church.

Furthermore in 2013, Gay-Straight Alliance clubs were introduced by our Catholic school boards. The supposed reason for the GSAs is to stop bullying of homosexual students. While bullying of any student, including homosexual students, is sinful, GSAs by their very nature advocate the acceptance of the homosexual lifestyle. That is unacceptable in a Catholic school.

It’s time for faithful Catholics to take back our Catholic schools. Publicly- funded Catholic schools are broken beyond repair. The rot has reached to the core. It’s time to establish parochial schools that are authentically Catholic.

Our bishops need to take a stronger position in the religious education of Ontario’s children. Concerned Catholics need to be able to look to the Assembly of Catholic Bishops of Ontario, lead by His Eminence Thomas Cardinal Collins (President), to ensure that our children are properly formed in Catholic teachings.

End the secularization of Catholic schools. End the widespread dissension that is destroying the faith of our children. We must speak up and defend the Faith. We must be a unified force for Truth and the future of Catholic education.

This development affects all Catholics, whether or not we have children in publicly-funded Catholic schools. We are all part of the same Catholic family and what happens to some of the family has major repercussions for all of us.

Make your voice heard. Write to OECTA, the bishops, and Cardinal Collins. Ask your parish priest to speak out against this latest assault on God’s natural laws.

Assembly of Catholic Bishops of Ontario
10 St. Mary St., Suite 800
Toronto, Ontario M4Y 1P9
Phone: 416-923-1423
Fax: 416-923-1509

Contact the Assembly of Catholic Bishops of Ontario online here

Cardinal Thomas Collins, President
Assembly of Catholic Bishops of Ontario
Phone: 416-934-0606, ext. 609
Fax: 416-934-3452
archbishop@archtoronto.org

Contact OECTA online here.

                        
James Ryan, President                            Kevin O'Dwyer, Past President

Tuesday, March 11, 2014

Friend claims James Dunleavy murdered mum in 'honour killing' because he felt she'd shamed family



20 Jan 2014 09:06


MOHAMMED Razaq believes Muslim convert Dunleavy misinterpreted the Koran and beheaded his mum in an honour killing after she split from his dad.



James Dunleavy


EVIL James Dunleavy beheaded his mother in an “honour killing” as he believed she had shamed the family, a former friend claims.

Irishman Dunleavy, 40 – a Muslim convert – was last week found guilty of killing 66-year-old Philomena, cutting up her body and burying her in a shallow grave.

He was ordered to be detained in the State Hospital at Carstairs before he returns to court for sentencing in April.

It has now emerged that Dunleavy may have misinterpreted the Koran and slaughtered his mother in an honour killing after she split from his dad.

Mohammed Razaq, who ran the shop below Dunleavy’s Edinburgh flat, befriended him after he moved to Scotland and helped him convert to Islam.

Razaq believes the killer felt his mother had betrayed the family by leaving his
dad and going to live with another man. He said: “It’s a tragic event, I feel
gutted.

“I wish it had never happened and I feel sorry for James for carrying out such a heinous crime.

“I think it was an honour killing, he was trying to protect his family’s honour.”

A source added: “James was pretty obsessed when it came to religion.

“He was brought up a Catholic but just decided one day he would convert to Islam.

“He was very, very serious about it and cared a lot about it. His faith was very
important to him and he prayed five times a day.

“I can’t say if he killed his mum because he converted, but he believed very strongly in the morals of the Koran and was furious about his mum leaving his dad for someone else.

“He saw it as adultery and they had a massive argument about it.”

Dunleavy had denied murdering his mum at his home between April 30 and May 7 last year.

Her dismembered remains were discovered by a cyclist on nearby Corstorphine Hill on June 6 last year.

A jury at the High Court in Edinburgh found Dunleavy guilty of the lesser charge of culpable homicide on the grounds of diminished responsibility on Friday.

Sunday, March 9, 2014

Repeating 1939: The Islamization of the West


JANUARY 21, 2014

by William Kilpatrick


In his 2005 book, The West’s Last Chance, Tony Blankley noted that there is a “natural human instinct to forget the distant past and to assume that the more or less benign trends of the recent past will continue.” Nevertheless, observed Blankley, “shocking divergences from the status quo have defined the path of history.” But these divergences are seldom anticipated. For example, “Londoners in the summer of 1939, my parents included, never expected that forty thousand of their fellow Londoners would soon lie dead in the streets from German bombing.”

The West’s Last Chance is about the danger that Islamization poses to the West. Blankley’s book warns that the citizens of the West face a threat similar to that faced by Londoners in 1939 and are handicapped by a similar inability to recognize the gravity of the threat.

The evidence for Islamization in Europe that Blankley pointed to in 2005 is far more abundant than it was when he wrote. But rather than go over facts that have been chronicled in detail in numerous recent books and articles, let’s ask why Westerners have so much difficulty in recognizing what should be obvious.

Part of the difficulty lies in the natural tendency to “forget the distant past” and assume that the status quo will continue. In our times this tendency is exacerbated by a greater than usual disconnect from the past. Modern man has difficulty remembering the near past, let alone the distant past. To a generation hooked on the sensation of the moment, 9/11 already seems like ancient history. So does the Beslan atrocity, the London tube bombing, and the month-long rioting in three hundred French cities that occurred in 2005. The Boston Marathon bombing happened less than a year ago but seems destined to quickly fade from memory since it was immediately characterized as a “one-off”—an isolated event perpetrated by a couple of self-radicalized lone wolves. It joins a long list of similar “one-off” incidents that include the Buffalo beheading, the “underwear bombers” failed attempt to bring down a jetliner, and Faisal Shazhad’s attempt to blow up Times Square.

It’s all the more difficult to remember the past when the media, the government, and other censors impose an unofficial ban on noticing a pattern to certain events. You have undoubtedly seen those streaming headlines at the bottom of your TV screen—the ones that report the daily toll taken by suicide bombers and church-burners. You may not know that the Religion of Peace.com website actually keeps track of all the deadly Islamic terrorist attack since 9/11. As of September 11, 2013 they had documented 21,583. Earlier generations, less encumbered by political correctness, would have been able to discern a pattern in that, and they would have discerned it long before the number reached five figures. We, however, have been conditioned to view such incidents as discrete, disconnected events. It would be impolite, impolitic, and even Islamophobic to draw conclusions based on such “scattered” evidence. Today’s good citizen can be counted on not to jump to conclusions. Indeed, he can be counted on to look at acres of evidence and not see a thing.

There is still another factor that helps account for the absence of alarm about our situation vis-à-vis Islam—namely, a lack of imagination. It seems paradoxical that a society so soaked in imaginative fantasy would have trouble imagining that what has happened many times in the past could happen again today. But that seems to be the case. Perhaps we suffer from fantasy overload. When everything is fantasy, nothing needs to be taken seriously. And today, just about all entertainment partakes of the fantastical. Futuristic, fantasy, and science fiction movies makes up a large chunk of Hollywood productions, and even ordinary action/adventure films contain action sequences that border on the fantastic. The main purveyors of fantasy, however, are the makers of video games. Youngsters spend many hours a day absorbed in these games, but so also do adults. According to one survey the average age of a gamer is thirty; another study puts it at thirty-seven. Critics of the gamer industry justifiably worry about the effect on impressionable minds of watching too much violent content, but the larger and more insidious threat that comes with long term use is a disconnect from reality, an inability to appreciate the significance of real world events. It’s difficult to read the writing on the wall if your eyes are glued to a computer screen for half the day.

Our ability to read the signs of the times seems to have been considerably diminished. For example, it shouldn’t take too much imagination to recognize the dark future that Islamists have in store for non-believers, seeing that their spiritual leaders are all too willing to publicly declare it and seeing that the bleak future has already arrived for countless non-Muslims in the Muslim world. And the evidence that Islamist designs are not limited to the Muslim world continues to mount. Despite a well-established historical pattern of conquest through immigration on the part of Muslims, Europe continues to welcome a steady stream of Muslim immigrants, with the result that in many large European cities the Muslim population ranges between 25 and 40 percent. It’s estimated that in Brussels, the self-styled “Capital of Europe,” Muslims will comprise the majority of the population within 15 years. If Muslims were assimilating to Western ways and values it might be a different story, but many European Muslims seem to have taken to heart Turkish Prime Minister Erdogan’s belief that “assimilation is a crime against humanity.” In France alone, there are 751 Muslim controlled “no-go-zones;” in England, Muslims have their own sharia courts; in Scotland, the country’s largest-ever child immunization program was halted following Muslim complaints; in many countries schools have dropped the Holocaust and the Crusades from their curriculums at the behest of Muslims and have complied with Muslim demands for all-halal menus. Moreover, in deference to Islamic blasphemy laws, critics of Islam have been hauled before inquisitorial courts, and across Northern Europe numerous counter-jihad rallies have been cancelled out of fear of the “Antifas”—gangs of street thugs whose mission is to silence those critics of Islam who escape the court system. Meanwhile, churches are burned, Jews are beaten in the streets, and violent crime has skyrocketed.

As in 1939, the European elites have reacted to this cultural putsch with cringing appeasement. The press has muzzled itself. Critics of Islam are hounded from pillar to post. Academics explain away every problem from rioting to rape in terms of poverty and discrimination. And governments increase their already lavish subsidies for the building of more mosques and madrassas. In cultural terms, European leaders have already yielded up to Islam the equivalent of several Sudetenlands. But not everyone who has eyes to see, sees. For those who live in a non-historical fantasy world, the real world can be kept at bay for a surprisingly long time, and for them life will go on as usual—until it doesn’t.

Still, it would seem that today’s harsh realities would be hard to miss even for those inclined to fantasy. For imaginative fantasy it’s hard to beat the worldwide resurgence of a seventh-century religious ideology whose founder, like the characters in The Lord of the Rings, was in the habit of naming his swords, and whose re-emergence as a power on the world stage is as vehemently denied as is the return of Voldemort in a Harry Potter story. Yet “He-Who-Must-Not-Be-Named” (except in the most respectful way) has returned with a vengeance. And if Iranian leaders are right, the Mahdi is also scheduled to return at any moment. He’s the “Hidden Imam” who has been in a trance state since the ninth century but will reappear to defeat the infidels provided the Shia leaders can provoke a sufficiently cataclysmic triggering event in the Middle East.

The world hasn’t seen so many gathering storm clouds since … well, since 1939. We live in interesting times. You would think that more people would notice.


Editor’s note: Above, British Prime Minister Neville Chamberlain is famously pictured in 1938 returning from Munich after having negotiated an agreement with Hitler promising “peace in our time.”




By William Kilpatrick

William Kilpatrick taught for many years at Boston College. He is the author of several books about cultural and religious issues, including Psychological Seduction; Why Johnny Can’t Tell Right From Wrong; and, most recently,Christianity, Islam and Atheism: The Struggle for the Soul of the West. Professor Kilpatrick’s articles on cultural and educational topics have appeared in First Things, Policy Review, American Enterprise, American Educator, Los Angeles Times, and various scholarly journals. His articles on Islam have appeared inCatholic World Report, National Catholic Register, Aleteia, Saint Austin Review, Investor’s Business Daily, FrontPage Magazine, and other publications. His work is supported in part by the Shillman Foundation.