‘Our help is from God, who made heaven and earth’
Credit to Author: RICARDO SALUDO| Date: Sat, 19 Oct 2019 18:36:59 +0000
Will not God then secure the rights of his chosen ones who call out to him day and night? Will he be slow to answer them? I tell you, he will see to it that justice is done for them speedily. But when the Son of Man comes, will he find faith on earth?
– Jesus in the Gospel of Saint Luke, 18:7-8
Does God really succor the poor and distressed calling out to him 24/7?
There is no shortage of exhortations for humanity to have faith in the Lord and His providence and power. Take the Mass readings today and last Sunday.
As quoted above, no less than our Lord himself assured that God “will see to it that justice is done.” Today’s responsorial Psalm 121 chants of “our help from God,” and last
week’s Psalm 98 extols his “saving power.” And St. Paul writes Timothy that those who die with Christ “shall also live with him,” and “if we persevere we shall also reign with him.” And in last Sunday’s Gospel reading from Luke, 10 lepers are cleansed.
Now, let’s get real: Is justice done? Is there help and saving power from above? Are the unclean cleansed? Will the Christ-like live and reign with him? And will the godly forces triumph, as Joshua defeated Amalek by God’s power?
If one answers a string of no’s to those questions, one is not alone. Indeed, one may be in a worldwide chorus, doubting or dismissing divine power, and banking on worldly wealth, power and know-how instead.
Well, be ready to see the power of heaven on earth.
When God stopped world war
What if the Lord, speaking through his Blessed Mother Mary, had warned of global war, then actually stopped it several times with her intercession?
That was what the Blessed Virgin promised over a century ago to three shepherd children in Fatima, Portugal: Lucia dos Santos, 9; and her cousins St. Francisco, 8, and St. Jacintha Marto, 6, canonized on the centenary of Mary’s May 13, 1917 apparition.
On her third apparition on July 13, 1917, our Blessed Mother unveiled three secrets, and the second warned of World War 2.
“The war will end,” Our Lady confided, referring to the First World War raging across Europe in 1914 to 1918. “But if people don’t stop offending God, another, even worse, will begin in the reign of Pope Pius 11th.”
“To prevent this,” Mary continued, “I shall come to ask the consecration of Russia to my Immaculate Heart and the Communion of Reparation on the first Saturdays [of the month]. If people attend to my requests, Russia will be converted, and the world will have peace.”
But the Pope and his fellow bishops didn’t. Reigning since 1922, Pius 11th — yup, the man in whose pontificate a more destructive war was prophesied — disdained Fatima:
“I am His [Christ’s] vicar on earth. If He had something He wished me to know, He would tell it to me directly.”
As Mary warned, a worse conflict erupted. Germany marched into Austria in 1938, the year before Pius 11th died. And Soviet Russia, under communist rule, spread the godless ideology to half of humanity.
Consecrations advance peace and faith
Fortunately, the next Holy Father, Pius 12th, listened to the Holy Mother of God. On Oct. 31, 1942, a quarter-century after Fatima, he consecrated the Church and the world to the Immaculate Heart of Mary.
Four days later, the Allies won their first major victory over German forces at El Alamein in Egypt against the greatest Nazi general Erwin Rommel. Afterward, the Allies won victory after victory until final triumph.
History felt more of Mary’s saving hand.
In July 1952, three and a half decades after Fatima, Pius 12th consecrated Russia in an Apostolic Letter.
That year, Soviet leader Josef Stalin plotted an invasion to establish communism across Europe, assuming America would not intervene and risk nuclear conflict. The following March, Stalin died of brain hemorrhage. War plans ended, and Stalin’s successors warmed ties with the West, provoking a split with Red China.
Pope Saint Paul 6th was next. As the Second Vatican Council adjourned on Nov. 21, 1964, the feastday of the Presentation of Mary, the Holy Father consecrated the world to the Immaculate Heart.
That same day, the Chinese Communist Party’s “Red Flag” journal blasted Soviet leaders for continuing rapprochement with the West. That cemented the split between the socialist behemoths, gravely weakening the global ideology till its final defeat in the pontificate of Pope St. John Paul 2nd, after his own Marian consecrations.
On May 13, 1981, the 64th anniversary of Fatima’s first apparition, the saint survived an assassin’s bullets in St. Peter’s Square. He thanked Mary’s intervention, and “entrusted” the world to the Immaculate Heart on Dec. 8, 1981, the Solemnity of Mary’s Immaculate Conception, and again on May 13, 1982, one year after the attack, the 65th anniversary of Fatima.
Finally, on the Solemnity of the Annunciation on March 25, 1984, St. John Paul 2nd consecrated the world. He omitted mention of Russia, but prayed that Our Lady “enlighten [and] bless those peoples for whom You Yourself are awaiting our act of consecration and entrusting.”
Less than two months later, on the very feast of Fatima, May 13, 1984, an explosion at the Soviet arsenal in Severomorsk destroyed two-thirds of its main fleet’s ordnance.
That ended the invasion plan Moscow had planned, to take out US intermediate-range ballistic missiles (IRBMs) in Europe, able to nuke the Soviets with no time to strike back.
The following year, the deaths of two hardline Soviet leaders elevated reformist Mikhail Gorbachev to power. Three years later, on Dec. 8, 1987, he and his American counterpart Ronald Reagan agreed to scrap IRBMs. Gorbachev’s reforms eventually collapsed Soviet communism exactly four years later.
Today, Russian President Vladimir Putin has restored property seized by communists from the Russian Orthodox Church. State enterprises are funding the building of churches. From 3,000 before the 1984 consecration, there are now some 39,000 Russian Orthodox places of worship.
One more Marian act of peace. On June 5, 2017, at the height of the Korean missile crisis, the International Pilgrim Statue of Our Lady of Fatima was brought to the Demilitarized Zone between North and South Korea.
Less than a year later, North and South leaders met at the border and forged a pact for peace. And the North’s Kim Jong Un met with US President Donald Trump in Singapore in June last year.
Thanks and praise be to God! Amen.