FIFTH HERESY
Error of a remote hereafter outside space and time,
of disincarnate Christ, and of an evanescent Kingdom

ARGUMENT

WE are very shaken in our faith and in our confidence in the Church by the double shock of this Catechism’s modernity which goes beyond our understanding of dogmatic Truth and which breaks with the living treasure of our Catholic Tradition. The first shock is experienced as a rent or schism, the other shock as a gnostic speculation or heresy.

Whether it be a question of God’s supernatural relations with us, involving predestination and grace, or of our relations with the Word Incarnate, Jesus Christ, who calls us to follow Him by taking up our cross so that we might be saved, or of the drama of His sorrowful Passion suffered at the hands of wicked men for the redemption of the world, we cannot accept that the CCC should abuse Sacred Scripture with such dishonest and lying audacity nor that it should disdain and contradict the entire living, eloquent and edifying Tradition of the centuries in order to wrench us insolently from our own popular and universal religion. For such is the schism in which this Catechism is perversely and delightedly steeped. To us it seems like sacrilege.

If only it were done to make divine Revelation speak to us and move us still more, to make it more accessible and to raise us up to the splendours of God ! But no, it is completely the other way round. At every article of the Creed, our immemorial convictions, our common Catholic mentality are broken, annihilated and replaced by abstract theories that are totally inconsistent with our faith, or rather contrary and alien to its divine Truth and clarity. It is a multiform heresy that pursues its course and becomes more complex from one chapter to the next, leaving us shattered and miserable. It is an intellectual gnosis, an optimistic vision, but one that is demobilising and without love, where God speaks less and less and man withdraws into his all pervading me. It is a series of heresies leading to apostasy.

So now that Jesus has completed His course and saved all men, for now and for ever, we wonder what paradox we shall be told about His future and ours. It will be a decisive test. If our traditions and sentiments are again upset, it will lead to despair or else a universal slide into this fanciful religion where man makes himself the centre of the world and gives glory to himself with no further regard for God, His Heaven, nor hell itself...

And that is precisely what does happen !

The Resurrection, an historical and transcendent event

644. Even when faced with the reality of the risen Jesus, the disciples still doubt, so impossible did the thing seem to them: they think they are seeing a ghost… Which is why the hypothesis that the Resurrection might have been the “ product ” of the Apostles’ faith (or credulity) will not hold up. On the contrary, their faith in the Resurrection was born – under the action of divine grace – from their direct experience of the reality of the risen Jesus.

That sounds decisive and gladdens my old ancestral faith, saying to me: If He resumed His Body with such Truth, with such realism, it cannot be to dissolve it or lose it, neither tomorrow nor ever. Thus, the future before us is certain, that of a Kingdom of God that is complete and ravishing. Alas ! The CCC quickly extinguishes this flame:

645. The risen Jesus establishes direct relations with His disciples through touch and the sharing of meals. He thereby invites them to recognise that He is not a ghost and above all to realise that the risen body whereby He presents Himself to them is the same body that had been tortured and crucified, since He still bears the scars of His passion. This real and authentic body possesses at the same time, however, the new properties of a glorious body. It is no longer situated in space and time, but is able to be present where and when He wishes, for His humanity can no longer be retained on earth and now belongs to the divine realms of the Father only. For this reason too, the risen Jesus enjoys the sovereign freedom of appearing as He wishes: in the guise of a gardener or “ in other forms ” (Mk 16.12) different from those which were familiar to the disciples, precisely in order to arouse their faith.

Here I wince at the expression “ It is no longer situated in space and time ”. It may sound very learned and very original, but to be exact: 1). It contemptuously dismisses the traditional language, understanding and representations of the Mystery, which have kept alive the Church’s hope for two thousand years. That in itself is schismatic. 2). It plays on two levels at once, that of the ancient language and that of its esoteric interpretations, without any concern about their incoherence and permanent contradiction. This game of equivocation hides the obvious inability of the new gnosis to explain what the state of the Risen One is today, “ outside time and space ”. Anything so inconceivable and defiant of Catholic dogma is necessarily heretical, and that is sufficient reason for rejecting it.

The continuation confirms our criticism:

646. Christ’s Resurrection was not a return to earthly life, as was the case with the resurrections He had performed before Passover: the daughter of Jairus, the young man of Naim, Lazarus. These actions were miraculous events, but the persons miraculously restored to life through the power of Jesus returned to an “ ordinary ” earthly life. At a certain moment, they will die again. The Resurrection of Christ is essentially different. In His risen body, He passes from the state of death to another life beyond time and space. The body of Jesus, in the Resurrection, is filled with the power of the Holy Spirit; He shares the divine life in His glorious state, so that St. Paul can say of Christ that He is “ the heavenly man ” (cf. 1 Cor 15.35-50).

The whole of this alignment of propositions, of no logical consequence or realistic coherence, is a purely intellectual digression from the fact of the Resurrection, gradually whittling it down so that nothing is left of Christ’s reality except the spiritual, without location or substance, without duration and synchrony, and without bodily or intellectual relations with other beings like Himself.

In fact, it ends up in this piece of verbosity, quite lacking in any historical or physical foundation:

655. … As they await the future resurrection, the risen Christ lives in the hearts of His faithful. In Him, Christians “ taste the powers of the world to come ” and their lives are swept up by Christ into the heart of the divine Life.

All of which no longer means anything...

But now for the Ascension – an Ascension to nowhere

659. “ So then the Lord Jesus, after He had spoken to them, was taken up into heaven, and sat down at the right hand of God ” (Mk 16.19). Christ’s Body was glorified at the instant of His Resurrection, as is proved by the new and supernatural properties His Body subsequently and permanently enjoys. But during the forty days when He eats and drinks familiarly with His disciples and instructs them about the Kingdom, His glory still remains veiled under the appearance of an ordinary humanity. Jesus’ final apparition ends with the irreversible entry of His humanity into the divine glory symbolised by the cloud and by the heavens, where He henceforth sits at God’s right hand. It is only in an exceptional and unique fashion that He will show Himself to Paul “ as to one untimely born ” (1 Cor 15.8) in one last apparition that will constitute him an apostle.

What is this “ irreversible entry ” of His humanity “ into the divine glory ” ? An “ irreversibility ” (sic !) immediately contradicted by the return of Jesus – which we are assured was exceptional – during the apparition to St. Paul on the road to Damascus ! And more solemnly contradicted by these words of the angels in the very account of the Ascension, which belies this supposed irreversibility: “ This same Jesus, who was taken up from you into heaven, will come back in the same way as you saw Him go into heaven. ” (Acts 1.11)

Is it possible to treat the divine Word and the apostolic testimony with such contempt ? – aligning this new gnosis with the faith and mixing everything up in hopeless confusion as in the following:

665. Christ’s Ascension marks the definitive entrance of Jesus’ humanity ( !) into God’s heavenly domain (sic !), whence He will come again, but which, in the meantime, conceals Him from human eyes.

Here truly, schism and heresy energetically join forces, obliging us to make a decisive choice between this distressing, worthless, apostate gnosis and our robust Catholic hope in the resurrection of the body and in the life everlasting. Amen !

The resurrection of the body no longer makes sense

This same perfidious language, this duplicity whereby pure gnostic imaginings are wedded to the substantial reality of our Catholic dogmas, may be an amusement for sceptical and destructive dilettantes. But nothing can come of it except the emptying of the Church and the dying of thirst of souls incapable of resisting alone the searing wind of these cursed inventions.

But here initially – to ensnare the faithful ? – are some solid affirmations concerning the dogma of the resurrection of the body:

989. We firmly believe, and thus we hope, that, just as Christ is truly risen from the dead and lives for ever, so likewise after their death, the just will live for ever with the risen Christ and He will raise them up on the last day…

990. The term “ flesh ” designates man in his condition of weakness and mortality. The “ resurrection of the flesh ” means not only that the immortal soul will live on after death, but that even our “ mortal bodies ” (Rom 8.11) will come to life again.

The CCC then goes on to multiply quotations from Sacred Scripture, from the Fathers, from the Councils, and from Benedict XII on Heaven, who is the most explicit (1023), all of which exclude the foolish and insubstantial idea of a bodily (and spiritual !) existence outside space and time. It is a pleasure to read and it reassures us:

997. What does it mean to rise again ? In death, the separation of the soul from the body, the human body decays, whilst the soul goes to meet God, all the while awaiting its reunion with its glorified body. God in His Omnipotence will definitively restore incorruptible life to our bodies, uniting them to our souls by virtue of Jesus’ Resurrection.

1015. “ The flesh is the pivot of salvation ” (Tertullian). We believe in God who is the Creator of the flesh; we believe in the Word made flesh for the redemption of the flesh; we believe in the resurrection of the flesh, the fulfilment of both the creation and the redemption of the flesh.

But if we allow ourselves to be taken in, our disappointment will be only too bitter. Why speak of the resurrection of the body, if it is not to go to a place just as material and to live out, along with the saints or demons, a destiny that is fully human ? But instead, we are now presented with the void of a gnosis of “ nowhere ”, where heresy and schism are exacerbated by a perfidious negation of the faith.

Heaven, Purgatory, Limbo, and Hell: the states of souls who are nowhere !

Seeing that Christ is risen and the Virgin Mary raised up into the Heavens, according to the CCC:

966. “ … having accomplished the course of Her earthly life, the Immaculate Virgin was assumed body and soul into the glory of Heaven, and exalted by the Lord as Queen of the universe, to conform more fully to her Son, the Lord of lords, victorious over sin and death ” … …Their mutual presence necessarily constitutes a space, inaugurates a place, called Heaven or Paradise, the happy abode of the elect. And consequently, other places will be allocated for the eternal destination of other humans, body and soul, for their happiness, their temporary purification, or their eternal damnation. Whenever the CCC speaks of these things it is in the traditional language, but it never misses an opportunity to dissolve their reality into gnostic fantasies of no substance or truth:

Heaven ? It is a state, not a place.

1024. This perfect life with the Most Holy Trinity, this communion of life and love with the Trinity, the Virgin Mary, the angels and all the blessed, is called “ Heaven ”. Heaven is the ultimate end and fulfilment of man’s deepest aspirations, the state of supreme and definitive happiness.

1025. To live in heaven is “ to be with Christ ”. The elect live “ in Him ”, but there they retain, or rather find, their true identity, their proper name. “ For life is to be with Christ; where Christ is, there is life, there is the kingdom. ”

Purgatory ? It is a purification that takes place nowhere.

1031. The Church gives the name Purgatory to this final purification of the elect, which is quite distinct from the punishment of the damned. The Church formulated her doctrine of faith on Purgatory chiefly at the Councils of Florence and Trent. The tradition of the Church, referring to certain texts of Scripture, speaks of a purifying fire…

Hell ? It is unhappiness without fire or place !

1033. … Our Lord warns us that we shall be separated from Him if we neglect to meet the grave needs of the poor and the little ones who are His brethren. To die in mortal sin without having repented and without having welcomed God’s merciful love is to remain separated from Him for ever through our own free choice. And it is this state of definitive self-exclusion from communion with God and the blessed that is designated by the word “ hell ”.

Here at last the Antichrist accidentally reveals himself:

I know of nothing more insulting to Jesus Christ, to His Church, to His preachers, and to generations of pious believers and saints, than this mockery of Christ’s words:

1027. This mystery of blessed communion with God and with all those who are in Christ surpasses all understanding and representation. Scripture speaks to us about it in images: life, light, peace, wedding feast, wine of the kingdom, the Father’s house, the heavenly Jerusalem, paradise: “ no eye has seen, nor ear heard, nor the heart of man conceived, what God has prepared for those who love Him. ” (1 Cor 2.9)

So much for the representations and conceptions that Christians unanimously, everywhere, and always, have formed, preached and believed on the word of Christ. They are swept aside as childish dreams and crude imagination, even though they are drawn from Sacred Scripture and were always respected as figures chosen by Jesus – and by St. John ! – to describe Heaven, where Jesus and Mary are enthroned in the fullness of happiness and glory. The inspired language of Scripture suggests, better than any learned discourse or quintessential abstraction, that the promised Paradise is a magnificent place of the same kind – though better ! – as the earth, the sky, the seas and the forests, and all the splendours of body and mind. It expresses a beauty, a tenderness, a delight in love and knowledge far greater than those of the mystery of the child in its mother’s womb, of the bride in the arms of her spouse, of the family gathered around the table at the wedding feast, of the liturgy for the consecration of virgins, of the ordaining of a bishop, of the ecstasy of Magdalene at the feet of the teaching Jesus, or that of the disciple whom Jesus loved listening to His divine heartbeat on the evening of the Last Supper.

All of this is treated with contempt and its truth is contested. But is it rejected in favour of anything better ? Yet it is JESUS who spoke thus, and it is what St. John recounted to us in his visions ! These admirable, holy, simple and touching allegories are certainly true. Has anything better ever been found to tell the crowds, in order to give them the love of this eternal life ? To talk about “ the intuitive vision of the divine essence, without the mediation of any creature ” (1024) is too laborious and too late. If the faithful are deprived of a language that speaks to them and of all the allegories that form the material of Christian preaching, they will no longer see, savour or even understand the meaning of this word “ Beatitude ”. Why should they sacrifice the substance for the shadow, the reality of happiness for its fiction, and finally earthly joys for the boredom of Heaven !

For I know from pastoral experience – something in which our authors seem to be entirely lacking – that those who listen to their dreary talk are sadly afraid of feeling bored in Heaven. And perhaps just as much in hell – this new hell that is neither a place, nor a fire, nor any kind of crudely imagined torture, but merely the privation, pure and simple, of the direct vision of the divine essence... which means nothing to them. Boredom, I tell you, exudes from every page of this Catechism for intellectuals ! It is a Catechism without imagination or poetry, and therefore closed to the divine mysteries.

Which of course is its aim.

AFTER THE CYCLE OF THE FATHER AND THE CYCLE OF JESUS ARE CLOSED, THE WAY IS FREE AT LAST FOR THE REIGN OF “ THE SPIRIT ”

ACCUSATION JUSTIFIED

Two religions have been fighting it out in the Church since the Council. And finally, in this Catechism, it is the new religion that must destroy the old. We are in an essential phase here. Jesus is risen, yes ! but at the price of an obliteration into the invisible, of a loss of bodily being and of presence to the world. Such is the wish of our gnostics. He has gone “ beyond space and time ” (645-646), in a way that is “ irreversible ” (659-660). One certitude: He will not return until all is accomplished.

What is this mystery ? Impossible to count on the least honesty from “ the Catholic Church ” as invoked by the catechism’s author. Among a thousand lies, here is one proof:

Christ descended into hell

True or false ? After a long quotation from an ancient homily, recounting this descent in realistic and touching terms, and nurturing the faith, hope and joy of Christians (635 b), the CCC throws out the following conclusions:

636. By the expression “ Jesus descended into hell ”, the Apostles’ Creed confesses that Jesus really died and that, by His death for us, He conquered death and the devil “ who holds the power of death ” (Heb 2.14).

That is the thinking – I dare not say the faith – of the Pope and of the Cardinal, “ confessing ” something other than what their lips pronounce ! But, after the lie, here is the opposite:

637. The dead Christ, in His soul united to His diviner person, descended to the abode of the dead. To the just who had preceded Him He opened the gates of Heaven.

That is a clear and precise expression of the faith of all places and all times. In saying this, the CCC rejects as schismatic and heretical what it said before. Conclusion: it lies when it speaks the Catholic truth (637) in order to distract us from its gnosis, which is the truth behind its lie (636).

With that proof established, here is my actual accusation: All that concerns the mystery of Jesus, Son of God made man, starting with the event of His Resurrection – namely articles 6 and 7 of the Creed: He ascended into Heaven and is seated at the right hand of God the Father Almighty (659-667), From whence He shall come to judge the living and the dead (668-682) – and continuing with articles 11 and 12: I believe in the resurrection of the body and the life everlasting – everything concerning the Life beyond death and beyond this earth is of absolutely no interest or value to X, the author of the CCC.

Writers of every tendency are allowed to develop their ideas in the CCC. Those of a better heart have applied themselves to stating Catholic Truth. But correctors have intervened with a few words to relegate it all to the realm of vain images and doubtful tradition. Their principal aim is that Jesus should disappear from our horizon for the complete duration of our human history in order that the reign of the Spirit may arrive and realise, without further let or hindrance, what the humanist gnosis governing the mind and works of today’s Church has decided to see arrive.

It is agreed that God the Father loves men and will see that their great projects in this world succeed. It is also certain that Jesus became the Saviour of all and that their absolute future is guaranteed. It only remains for man to work with the power of “ the Spirit ” in the construction of the Man in each and every one of us. That is what absorbs the attention of the Catechism, no other futile concern.

ANATHEMAS

I. If anyone says that the risen Jesus Christ has gone beyond space and time, and that His ascent into Heaven is thenceforth irreversible, let him be anathema.

II. If anyone says that Heaven, Purgatory and Hell are not places but states, nay moral situations or pure feelings of joy or sorrow, let him be anathema.

III. If anyone says that no one can be the object of a damnation sentence to eternal hell, but that the rebel finds himself punished by his own self-excluding decision, whose freedom God respects, let him be anathema.