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How should we understand the times in which we live? The way you answer that question will determine EVERYTHING you do in response to them -- and how you will lead your family, your parish, your religious community . . . everything.
Since 2016, the two words that come to me every time I reflect on the signs of our times are "eclipse" and "apocalypse" -- each word carrying tremendous meaning. The signs of that year's significance were everywhere.
In 2016, the most important presidential election in the history of the United States was about to take place. Spiritually, it was the Jubilee of Mercy issued by Pope Francis that would lead the Church right up to the 100th anniversary Our Blessed Mother's visitation and message to the world at Fatima in 1917. And I remember a brief conversation I had with an old priest-friend who is known all around the world for speaking on Divine Mercy and Consecration to Mary. We both had a strong sense that the Year of Mercy was one of God's last gifts to prepare the Church and the world for something very big to come in the near future. Fast forward to almost exactly four years later, that "something very big" now seems to be imminent as we see society spiraling into decline at warp speed.
Then there were the celestial signs. The two most notable were the total solar eclipse on August 21, 2017, that took place during the 100th anniversary of Fatima and the Revelation 12 sign that occurred This coincided with the anniversary of the apparitions of Mary at Knock on August 21, 1879 -- a silent apparition taken directly out of the book of the Apocalypse.
The path of the eclipse went right through the heart of the United States as if to display the ideological division that existed in our country.
Something very similar happened right before the United States Civil War and then again in 1914 right before World War I as a total solar eclipse passed over Eastern Europe as if to announce judgment on mankind for turning its back on God. And then again on July 8, 1918 right before the Spanish Flu pandemic affected over 500 million people worldwide. A great article on the significance of eclipses (both solar and lunar) in the Bible and how they connect to the modern world as modern "signs of Johan", click here. It is pretty mind blowing.
Then you have almost unbelievable celestial event that took place on September 23, 2017 -- exactly 33 days after the total solar eclipse of August 21, 2017 (Our Lady of Knock). This celestial is called by many the "Revelation 12 Sign" because it is right out of the Book of the Apocalypse, Chapter 12.
Now check this out . . . The beginning of this celestial event began on November 20, 2016 (the Feast of Christ the King). It marked the end of the jubilee of Mercy). On that day, the planet Jupiter enters constellation Virgo like Christ entering the womb of Mary. 9 1/2 months later Jupiter exits womb of Virgo and on that day, September 23, the sun rose and appeared behind Virgo when the moon was literally under the feet of Virgo and above the head of Virgo was a crown of 12 stars (nine from Leo and three from the planets Mars, Venus and Mercury). Having seen this with my own eyes, it was absolutely incredible! You just can't make this stuff up!
Here again we find the truth of Fulton Sheen's words:
“Nothing ever happens out of Heaven except with the finesse of all details."
Since 2016, the moral eclipse within America and throughout the world has only escalated. It has escalated because because the forces of anti-Christ driving the global power elite are now going for broke as they know the end game of their "new world order" is being exposed. It is the finishing of what the French Revolution started in 1789 and what the Russian Revolution took to the world in 1917. This is a revolution because it seeks the elimination of God from all aspects of society, the redefinition of marriage and the family and even the gender difference itself. This is at the heart of the atheistic Marxist revolution and it is right in front of our face here in America.
The war is on and escalating quickly by the day. It is the war announced by John Paul II (then Karol Wojtyla) in 1976 when speaking to all the US bishops:
"We are now standing in the face of the greatest historical confrontation humanity has gone through. I do not think that wide circles of American society or wide circles of the Christian community realize this fully. We are now facing the final confrontation between the Church and the anti-Church, of the Gospel versus the anti-Gospel."
And in that same address, St. John Paul II told the Catholic Church in America:
"We must prepare ourselves to suffer great trials before long, such as will demand of us a disposition to give up even life, and a total dedication to Christ and for Christ... With your and my prayer it is possible to mitigate this tribulation, but it is no longer possible to avert it, because only thus can the Church be effectively renewed. How many times has the renewal of the Church sprung from blood! This time, too, it will not be otherwise. We must be strong and prepared, and trust in Christ and His mother, and be very, very assiduous in praying the Rosary."
Brothers and sisters, make no mistake. We are at that moment.
It is overwhelmingly clear in our days that we are experiencing the greatest eclipse of truth, reason, morality, Christian values and pretty much anything inherently human. With over 50+ gender options in Facebook as one significant example, modern civilization not only doesn't who they are, they don't know what they are. Absolutely devastating.
Add to this the widespread experience of the latin saying motus in fine velocior, which translates as "things quicken at the end," especially the end of an era. Just as the sun rises and sets with a quickening at beginning and end of each day, so too are the historical ends that bring to an end to one era and announce the arrival of the next. And we see clearly announced by the signs above in the heavens and in the real time events unfolding on earth, especially in the breakdown of society, that this era is coming to an end and very soon. A civilization which has rejected God, as ours has done today, will quickly crumble.
But there is hope amidst the eclipse and it is seen at the moment at which it reaches what is called totality. At that moment something special happens. We see that the moon could not blot out the full light of the sun. At the moment of greatest darkness, the sun still wins and it announces it by revealing to the naked eye its outer rim called the corona (which means "crown"). The sun is still king at the greatest hour of darkness and we see in the heavens the truth that "the light shines in the darkness and the darkness has not overcome it" (John 1:5).
And from that moment, the light and warmth of the sun returns.The unveiling, the Apocalypse, begins and heaven gives us the great sign in the heavens, a woman clothed with the sun to guide us through the remaining darkness and storm until the new day, the new era arrives.
We will look more at the great hope of this apocalypse in my next post and during my live webcast with singer, blogger and evangelizer, Mark Mallett. He is one the founders of Countdown to the Kingdom and he has dedicated his life to helping the Church understand the signs of our times and what to do about them. YOU WILL NOT WANT TO MISS THIS!!!!
JOIN US LIVE THIS TUESDAY, JUNE 9 at 5PM Pacific!!!!
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