The Prophecy of St. Nilus about Our Days

Realizing that St. Nilus is scarcely known to a large part of the Church, a brief sketch of his life, taken from the Catholic Encyclopedia (1911 copyright edition), is related below: St. Nilus was one of the many disciples and fervent defenders of St. John Chrysostom. He was an officer at the Court of Constantinople, married, with two sons. While St. John Chrysostom was patriarch, before his exile (398-403), he directed Nilus in the study of Scripture and in works of piety. St. Nilus left his wife and one son and took the other, Theodulos, with him to Mount Sinai to be a monk. The Bishop of Eleusa ordained both St. Nilus and his son to the priesthood. The mother and other son also embraced the religious life in Egypt. From his monastery at Sinai, St. Nilus was a well-known person throughout the Eastern Church. Through his writings and correspondence, he played an important part in the history of his time. He was known as a theologian, Biblical scholar and ascetic writer, so people of all kinds, from the Emperor down wrote to consult him. His numerous works, including a multitude of letters, consist of denunciations of heresy, paganism, abuses of discipline and crimes. He also wrote about rules and principles of asceticism, especially maxims on the religious life. He warns and threatens people in high places, Abbots and Bishops, Governors and Princes, even the Emperor himself, without fear. He kept up a correspondence with Gaina, a leader of the Goths, endeavoring to convert him from Arianism. He denounced vigorously the persecution of St. John Chrysostom both to the Emperor Arcadius and to his courtiers. St. Nilus must be counted as one of the leading ascetic writers of the 5th century. His feast is kept on November 12th in the Byzantine Calendar; he is commemorated also in the Roman Martyrology on the same date. St. Nilus probably died around the year 430, as there is no evidence of his life after that. The Prophecy of St. Nilus After the year 1900, toward the middle of the 20th century, the people of that time will become unrecognizable. When the time for the Advent of the Antichrist approaches, people’s minds will grow cloudy from carnal passions, and dishonor and lawlessness will grow stronger. Then the world will become unrecognizable. People’s appearances will change, and it will be impossible to distinguish men from women due to their shamelessness in dress and style of hair. These people will be cruel and will be like wild animals because of the temptations of the Antichrist. There will be no respect for parents and elders, love will disappear, and Christian pastors, Bishops and priests will become vain men, completely failing to distinguish the right-hand way from the left. At that time, the morals and traditions of Christians and of the Church will change. People will abandon modesty, and dissipation will reign. Falsehood and greed will attain great proportions, and woe to those who pile up treasures. Lust, adultery, homosexuality, secret deeds and murder will rule in society. Apostasy At that future time, due to the power of such great crimes and licentiousness, people will be deprived of the grace of the Holy Spirit, which they received in Holy Baptism and equally of remorse. The Churches of God will be deprived of God-fearing and pious pastors, and woe to the Christians remaining in the world at that time; they will completely lose their faith because they will lack the opportunity of seeing the light of knowledge from anyone at all. Then they will separate themselves out of the world in holy refuges in search of lightening their spiritual sufferings, but everywhere they will meet obstacles and constraints. And all this will result from the fact that the Antichrist wants to be Lord over everything and become the ruler of the whole universe, and he will produce miracles and fantastic signs. Read more…

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This is what pleases Jesus best, according to St. Faustina

hose who do not pray to Jesus in his Passion,” wrote the poet priest Gerard Manley Hopkins, “pray to God, but scarcely to Christ.” We pray with passion when we meditate on the Lord’s Passion.  How crucial to keep the cross at the center of our prayer. St. Leo the Great assures us that “through the cross the faithful receive strength from weakness, glory from dishonor, life from death.” In her Diary, St. Faustina relates:  Jesus told me that I please him best by meditating on his sorrowful Passion, and by such meditation much light falls upon my soul. He who wants to learn true humility should reflect upon the Passion of Jesus. When I meditate upon the Passion of Jesus, I get a clear understanding of many things I could not comprehend before. We can approach Christ’s Passion in prayer with hope and great peace. In the words of Joseph Ratzinger, “What looks down at us from the cross is a goodness that enables a new beginning in the midst of life’s horror.” And St. John Paul II adds, “The cross is like a touch of eternal love upon the most painful wounds of man’s earthly existence.” One practical way to meditate on the Lord’s Passion is to pray before a crucifix, for “the human heart is converted by looking upon him whom our sins have pierced” (CCC 1432). The Imitation of Christ tells us, “If you do not know how to meditate on heavenly things, direct your thoughts to Christ’s Passion and willingly behold his sacred wounds.” Also, of course, is prayerfully meditating on the Sorrowful Mysteries of the Rosary.   Read more…

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How long is Jesus present in the Eucharist after we’ve received communion?

he great treasure of the Catholic Church is the Eucharist — Jesus himself hidden under the appearances of bread and wine. We believe, as the Catechism states, that “In the most blessed sacrament of the Eucharist ‘the body and blood, together with the soul and divinity, of our Lord Jesus Christ and, therefore, the whole Christ is truly, really, and substantially contained’” (CCC 1374). Additionally, this Real Presence of Christ in the Eucharist does not end immediately when we receive him at Communion time. The Catechism goes on to explain how, “The Eucharistic presence of Christ begins at the moment of the consecration and endures as long as the Eucharistic species subsist” (CCC 1377). What does that mean when we receive him into our mouths? How long does Jesus’ Real Presence remain in our bodies? There is a famous story from the life ofSt. Philip Neri that helps answer that question. One day while he was celebrating Mass, a man received Holy Communion and left the church early. The man appeared to have no regard for the Presence within him and so Philip Neri decided to use this opportunity as a teaching moment. He sent two altar boys with lighted candles to follow the man outside of the church. After a while walking through the streets of Rome, the man turned around to see the altar boys still following him. Confused, the man returned to the church and asked Philip Neri why he sent the altar boys. Saint Philip Neri responded by saying, “We have to pay proper respect to Our Lord, Whom you are carrying away with you. Since you neglect to adore Him, I sent two acolytes to take your place.” The man was stunned by the response and resolved to be more aware of God’s presence in the future. It is generally assumed that the Eucharistic species of bread remains for about 15 minutes after reception. This is based on simple biology and reflects the Catechism’s statement that the presence of Christ “endures as long as the Eucharistic species subsist.”    This is why many saints have recommended offering 15 minutes of prayer after receiving the Eucharist as a thanksgiving to God. This allows the soul to savor the presence of God and have a true “heart-to-heart” with Jesus. Read more…

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15 Secret Tortures of Our Lord|With Meditative Images

15 Secret Tortures of Our Lord  (Each torture pray 1 Our Father,1 Hail Mary,1 Glory be) The consequent revelation was presented to Pope Clement II (1730-1740), who gave his imprimatur for public release. There are two official translations into English:”My tormentors considered Me as the most wretched man living on earth, that is why:”(1) They fastened My legs with rope and dragged Me over the stepping stones of the staircase, down into the filthy, nauseating cellar;  “(2) They took off My clothing and stung My body with iron joints; “(3) They attached a rope around My body and dragged Me on the floor, and then threw Me from wall to wall; “(4) They hung Me on a wooden beam with a loose knot from which I slipped and fell to the ground. Overwhelmed by this torture, I wept tears of blood. “(4) They hung Me on a wooden beam with a loose knot from which I slipped and fell to the ground. Overwhelmed by this torture, I wept tears of blood. “(5) They tied Me to a post and pierced My body with various tools and weapons; “(6) They struck Me with stones and burnt Me with blazing embers and torches; “(7) They pierced Me with awls; sharp spears tore My skin, flesh and arteries out of My body; “(8) They tied Me to a post and made Me stand barefoot on a heated metal sheet; “(9) They crowned Me with an iron crown and wrapped My eyes with the dirtiest possible rags; “(10) They sat Me on a chair with pointed nails, causing deep wounds in My body; “(11) They poured on My wounds molten lead and tar, and after this torture pressed Me again on the nailed chair, so that the nails went deeper and deeper into My flesh; “(12) To shame and torment Me, they drove needles into the holes of My uprooted beard; “(13) They threw on Me a cross and tied Me so tightly that I could hardly breathe; “(14) When I fell to the ground, they stomped on My head. One of them stepped on My chest, then took a thorn from My crown and drove it into My tongue; “(15) They poured into My mouth the most immodest excretions, as they uttered the most infamous expressions about Me. Then they tied My hands behind My back and led Me out of jail with strikes and blows.”

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Fulton Sheen’s Clear Warning About the Anti-Christ

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=LhaCjUGamjk By Joseph Pronechen , NC Register In 1947, Archbishop Fulton Sheen forewarned what no one thought possible for these times. Setting the Stage Far-seeing Archbishop Sheen said that the anti-Christ will not be called by that name, “otherwise he would have no followers.” Same for the way he, the devil, is depicted such as in cartoons because he “will wear no red tights, nor vomit sulphur, nor carry a trident nor wave an arrow tail as the Mephistopheles in Faust.” Nowhere does Scripture give us this idea of his appearance, Sheen emphasized. But it twists into an unlikely instrument. “This masquerade has helped the devil convince men that he does not exist,” Sheen revealed, setting the stage. The devil “knows that he is never so strong as when men believe that he does not exist. When no man recognizes, the more power he exercises.  God has defined Himself as I am Who am and the devil as ‘I am who am not.’” Has the masquerade worked since 1947? Let’s look at what the Center for Research on the Apostolate (CARA) noted in 2017 by looking over past and then current studies. CARA reported that in 1968 Gallup asked adults if they believe there is or is not a devil. 60% believed, 35% didn’t, and 5% weren’t sure. By 1982, Gallup carried on the survey at CARA’s request. Then 70% believed. Same for 2007. But CARA asked what they believed, and a survey four years later shockingly found that overall, 69% of all who believed in God believed the devil was only a symbol, while breakdowns showed even more shockingly that it appeared 83% of Catholics thought Satan was a symbol. (Of Catholics considered conservatives, 53% believed the devil was real, while of Catholics considered moderates only 49% thought so.) In a 2017 newspaper interview in Spain, the new superior general of the Society of Jesus said, “We have formed symbolic figures such as the devil to express evil. Social conditioning can also represent this figure, since there are people who act [in an evil way] because they are in an environment where it is difficult to act to the contrary.” But Sheen knew the devil is not a symbol. “Rather is he described as an angel fallen from heaven, and as ‘“the Prince of this world’ whose business it is to tell us that there is no other world,” he said, referring to Scripture. “His logic is simple:  if there is no heaven there is no hell; if there is no hell, then there is no sin; if there is no sin, then there is no judge, and if there is no judgement then evil is good and good is evil.” Stepping aside for a moment, we should also remember Our Lord’s words. Jesus made it perfectly clear when he described him: He was a murderer from the beginning and does not stand in truth, because there is no truth in him. When he tells a lie, he speaks in character, because he is a liar and the father of lies. Sheen then reminded that Our Lord told us that this devil, the anti-Christ, “will be so much like Himself, that he would deceive even the elect — and certainly no devil we have ever seen in picture books could deceive even the elect.” St. Paul wasn’t fooled either. He warned the Corinthians about those false ones infiltrating their numbers that (2, 11:14) “even Satan masquerades as an angel of light.” So how might the anti-Christ look and get followers to his “anti-religion”? False Front “He will come disguised as the Great Humanitarian; he will talk peace, prosperity and plenty not as means to lead us to God, but as ends in themselves,” Bishop Sheen warned. “He will write books on the new idea of God to suit the way people live; induce faith in astrology so as to make not the will but the stars responsible for sins; he will explain guilt away psychologically as inhibited eroticism, make men shrink in shame if their fellowmen say they are not broadminded and liberal; he will be so broadminded as to identify tolerance with indifference to right and wrong, truth and error; he will spread the lie that men will never be better until they make society better and thus have selfishness to provide fuel for the next revolution; he will foster science but only to have armament makers use one marvel of science to destroy another; he will foster more divorces under the disguise that another partner is ‘vital’; he will increase love for love and decrease love for person; he will invoke religion to destroy religion; he will even speak of Christ and say that he was the greatest man who ever lived; his mission he will say will be to liberate men from the servitudes of superstition and Fascism, which he will never define.” Much sounds familiar today, doesn’t it? That word “tolerance” blankets society. Pew Research reported last October that, by denomination, that 33% of Catholics believed in astrology, 36% in reincarnation, 46% in psychics. Also last October Pew reported that 76% of Catholics wanted the Church to allow birth control, 61% wanted to allow cohabiting couples to receive Communion, 62% to allow those divorced and remarried without an annulment to receive Communion, 46% to recognize gay/lesbian marriages. Love has deteriorated to Hollywood-record-television definitions. Match them up with what Sheen just described. Same Old Temptations Far-sighted Bishop Sheen showed how we servants are like the Master as he described the anti-Christ’s using the three temptations with which he tried to tempt Christ in the desert. By the way, Jesus was not tempted in the desert by a symbolic figure as some have come to believe. First, “the temptation to turn stones into bread as an earthly Messiah will become the temptation to sell freedom for security, as bread became a political weapon, and only those who think his way may eat.” Some dictatorships have laid the groundwork with this. Or, we…

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