Proof that the Catholic Faith is the Singular Truth and Must be Believed as Such

 

 

 

Divine Providence has provided for our time, the most perfect proof needed to show us the Truth of the Catholic Faith, in these days when we really need it. So few care to trouble themselves with a fuller understanding of the expectations of God for fear that they will be found wanting and thus be forced to recognize the changes that are needed in their lives.

 

They do not want to know more of what the Catholic Church might teach them and the sad truth is that most are lacking in Faith and the Acts of Faith that are associated with it. If they really factually knew what was required of them would they do it?

 

We are minimalists (doing the least that we think is necessary) mostly because we are so caught up and attached to the trappings of this world and its distractions. To do more would cause sacrifice and discomfort and change. And also because we are not convinced that we have to do it, in an absolute sense. If we had complete Faith we could not help but to model our lives as God expects, as the Catholic Church has taught, regardless of the earthly consequences.

 

If we were to understand that our Catholic Faith is not one of many religions, such that are worthy of modest effort, but rather the only religion that is completely true, out of the tens of thousands that exist in our time, we might then give it the sincere and total attention that it deserves. Just as if Jesus Christ Himself was standing before you telling you how to lead your lives, so that you would please God and one day dwell in Heaven.

 

Before us is the all the proof that we need to make this singular claim. There is a cement that binds our proclaimed religion to truth. Such that it should and would erase the doubt of the reality of the Catholic Faith, if a person could realize the powerful evidence that God has provided for us.

 

If we are honest with ourselves we must recognize that; either the Catholic Church is true and we must therefore obey Her precepts to please God and avoid Hell; or it is not true and it doesn't matter if we disregard certain aspects that we feel are not meaningful or necessary.

 

Weighing down on our lukewarm conviction and unfortunately for us in this time, we are overwhelmed with anti-Catholic thinking. The barrage is so pervasive and has existed long enough that nearly all who claim to be Catholic have no grasp or understanding what it truly means to lead a Catholic life. They believe the rationale and reasoning of social and moral secular "experts". They believe what they read in non-Catholic print and see on television. They believe what they are taught by Modernist philosophies. Whether they know it or not their comprehension of values and virtues is a corrupted and false understanding. This indeed is the danger of living in an anti-Catholic world. The culpability  of these individuals will be left to the Divine Judge and His factoring in their particular situations. But we do know that most offend God and are in critical danger of suffering eternally, if they had the chance to remove their ignorance and rejected it.

 

When most of these Souls hear fragments of the Truth, they turn away because what they are hearing is too foreign, too out-dated, too imposing, too difficult. They don't want to hear anymore. Woe to these who by their own pride and obstinacy fail the test of God to hear and be drawn to the Truth. They are too happy with the way things are, too attached to the seductions of this world. They seek ease, comfort, wealth, opulence, power, and lust after the pleasures of this life. In short there is no sacrifice, no atonement for sin, no amendment of lives to conform to the Will of God as revealed by the Catholic Church. There is not enough Faith to bring about acts of Faith. Just Faith in word, not in deed.

 

But they deceive themselves. Because there is no Catholic Faith in word alone. To be a Catholic requires that we conform our lives, that we amend our lives to do the Will of God as revealed by the Church and to resist our own Will which is inclined to do otherwise. Is it a light switch that can be turned-on to convert the darkness to light? It is and it isn't. For certainly our will can convert in an instant; we can, by God's Grace which he readily supplies, choose not to offend Him any longer. It is also a daily perseverance, for the rest of our lives, to apply what is taught and to learn more. To resist that which offends God and to strive to do only that which pleases Him. And to learn all that we can of God's expectations of us while here on Earth, that we may please Him more and offend Him less. We can never rest or feel that we are doing enough, as Satan would tempt us to believe. It is this devotion that is required of all who would call themselves Catholic. And it requires an increase in Faith, Hope, and Charity.

 

The Proof

 

The Catholic Church alone can righteously claim an unbroken link back to the Apostles and continuing through the Church Fathers, Doctors, Councils and Popes. It is by these persons that the Authority and the legitimacy of the Catholic Faith is established. If we read of those Apostles who were eyewitnesses to the man called Jesus Christ and His alleged Divinity, we are then faced with the truthfulness or falsehood of their experience and testimony. It is here where God has provided for His flock, that they may know the Truth and embrace it.

 

For these men who lived and heard Jesus Christ were not zealots. They were many times weak and not of great intellect. When they were tested they sometimes failed and were found wanting. And when their mentor was so brutally murdered, they were scandalized. Most fled and hid, one denied Him and another refused to believe that He had appeared after His death. Thus they were just like us, weak in Faith and lacking in fortitude. At that moment, despite wondrous miracles and teachings, they had seen the abrupt and brutal end of the Christ. His essence and mission was cast in doubt, because they did not fully understand His Divinity. They feared that all that had been told to them would not come to pass and that they would meet the same brutal end as Jesus.

 

We live our lives as if this is where the story ended and that it was just that, a nice story of a nice man who was not accepted and met a bitter end at the hands of his enemies. We accept the overall moral guidance that he taught. But the finer points, the more difficult life changing messages, are not really needed.

 

However the story continues... These men saw a risen Christ. A Christ whose Divinity was manifested to them. And their Faith became fact. In those days concluding on Pentecost they knew what none of us know. That Jesus was the Son of God and His Word. That His teachings had Divine authority and are Truth. That there was no questioning what our Father in Heaven expects of us. It had been revealed to them and they as the Church of Jesus Christ, the Catholic Church, were charged with bringing these expectations to all men as their only hope for eternal salvation.

 

We can be sure of their conviction and knowledge of the Truth by the very fact that they and many others were Martyrs. Martyrdom is the gift that God and the early Church gave us in modern times to know that this Catholic Faith is True. None of these men would have given their lives for something that they did not know to be true. If Christ had not risen from the dead, they would not have died for His message. But because of their former weakness and subsequent Martyrdom we know that they knew the Truth and proclaimed it. And by their fervent conviction to that Truth unto death, many others, who never knew Jesus Christ but knew that these Apostles knew that Jesus Christ was the Son of God, they then also had the conviction of Faith to receive their Martyr's crown.

 

Our Catholic Martyrs are our proof. The Saintly men and women who sacrificed their worldly lives for a beatific life. A beatific life that we know to be true, for those that persevere and conform their will to the Will of God, as the Faith of the Martyrs has shown us. And that the Faith of this Church of Christ, this Catholic Church, that was founded and passed-on unadulterated through these last millennia, must be believed to the extent of fact. For it is true ..... we have proof.

 

We are also called to be modern-day martyrs. We must sacrifice this worldly life of ours, just as they did theirs. Our martyrdom, even if not bloody, will nevertheless be very difficult. Think of those early souls who died because they believed with their whole existence what we believe on Sundays for an hour or two.

 

What can we do today and how can we do better tomorrow? Our Catholic Faith tells us all we need to know. We must be drawn to this Faith (that we really believe to be Fact), and to know more of what this Faith teaches us. This is what is required of us by our God. To know how to please Him more fully and to have that before us all day, every day.