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Reading Pascendi is not easy, but if you stick with it, it can be done and done well. There is a book titled "A Catechism of Modernism" by Fr. Lemius (first issues were titled A Catechism on Modernism). It was reprinted by TAN Books in 1993 or so, just before +F started doing his damage.
Thank you for the reference. Looking forward reading this. :reading:
You're welcome. I knew immediately upon first sight that
Pascendi was the Rosetta Stone to modern errors, but I had a hard time getting a solid handle on it until I studied
A Catechism of Modernism. Then all the pieces fit together flawlessly. I highly recommend it. You have to read each question and QUIZ yourself -- try to answer the question as best you can before reading the answer. Then, when you finish a chapter, go back and take the quiz again, this time WRITING YOUR ANSWERS DOWN ON PAPER, and checking against the book answers. It is really best if you get them correct word for word. And
if you really want to test yourself, do not read the book answers at all until you've written all your own answers down on the paper -- just as if you were taking a test in school (that's for the SECOND time through each chapter). This process will give you a solid foundation, because all the book answers are literal quotes from
Pascendi, and Fr. Lemius only composed the questions, such that the correct answers are found in the encyclical.
What then happens is, since you've memorized the correct answers, as you read the encyclical, the questions will pop into your mind and you will experience a kind of DIALOGUE with the author going on, which makes for new insights and comprehension, even applications to present affairs that the author could not have anticipated 107 years ago.
Modernism is indeed everywhere but it is not a new heresy. Old heresies never die. It has always been around. What afflict us deeply right now is that the modernist heresy actually triumphed against Eternal Rome in Vatican II.
I have heard it said that it was essentially Modernism that the devil used against Eve in the Garden of Eden. If this is true, then we have come full circle in the history of the world!
What makes Modernism specially hard to defeat is that it is a giant formless mass, like an amorphous monster deforming everything in Catholic doctrine. The synthesis of all heresies, as Pope Pius X wisely defined it.
You already have a very good grasp of what this "grand sewer of all heresies" is, and I have no doubt but that you will really appreciate Fr. Lemius' book.
The danger of Modernism is that it affects the very reason of humankind. The modernist mindset leads only to the death of reason, which causes men to quickly descend to the level of beasts. When the very foundation of reason is attacked as it is happening in current times, everything is turn upside down and all coherent thought is no more.
One good translation/summary said that "Modernism is the wreck and ruin of all religion." So it's not just the Catholic Faith that is at stake (as if that were not enough!) but also every other religion of mankind as well. This is why 'atheism' is on the rise in our time, because human reason has been undermined. Man's intellect has been the prime target of the devil's attacks. In previous ages, it was universally considered lunacy for anyone to deny the existence of God. Try explaining that to an atheist -- he'll accuse you of hate-speech and fable-mongering.
I think we're getting off-topic here. This really belongs in the Recusant #17 thread!
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