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Under Siege No Finer Time To Be A Faithful Catholic by Austin Ruse Crisis Publications Austin Ruse has been fighting the good fight for Catholic orthodoxy for some time. This work is about the good news of being a Catholic today. But, as any surgeon will tell us, we need to know how bad the fracture is before it can be healed. We are indeed in a bad way and Ruse gives us plenty of examples. He examines some of our greatest challenges: abortion, hatred of religion, pornography and gender ideology. Just when the elites are getting rid of our Christian heritage, they are busy introducing a new one: secularism. Actually, it is not that new: when the Supreme Court decided in 1962 that religion should be a private affair which has no place in schools, it was also saying that secularism does have a place in the schools and in society. The ban on contraception was deemed unconstitutional and, once again in the name of a so-called right to privacy, abortion for any reason and effectively at any time was imposed on all states. And more recently, we have "gay marriage." Our freedom to dissent from the new orthodoxy has been infamously described as "bonkers" and our right of free speech is already under fire. What is truly remarkable is that the public was not consulted on the major decisions about abortion and marriage: it has been imposed on us by the elite. The so-called cancel-culture will ensure that what was imposed on us will stay imposed. But where is the Church in all of this? Ruse notes that back in 2004, then Cardinal Ratzinger wrote to then Cardinal McCarrick stating that pro-abortion politicians should be barred from receiving Holy Communion. McCarrick suppressed the document and lied about it to his fellow bishops. The Church is also in bad shape at present. That wonderful Dickensian character Mr Dick proclaimed that "It's a mad world. Mad as Bedlam, my boy." And it is getting madder by the minute. Boys as young as six are told that they are really girls. During lockdown, the powers that be in New York City ensured that church worship would come to an end to prevent close human contact. But Ruse notes that it was fine for strangers to hook up with each other! After having given us the very bad news, Ruse gives us the good news. With God's help, we are called to live our lives as fully believing Catholics. We are called to defend the sanctity of life from conception till natural death. We need to confront the secularists by all peaceful means: they do not have any right to rule over us. But before all that, we need to pray and receive the sacraments. Ruse is very clear on what we should not do: we should not make a tactical retreat when confronted by the secularists. There are very few committed secularists, in actual fact. They should not be in charge. The Catholic Church is the one organization the secularists fear above all. As laity, we need to be a Christian presence in society. And we need to pray for strong leaders. This excellent book is a wake-up call for all of us. |