Blessings to All on This Feast of St. Macarius!

          On this day, March 10th, A.D. 2012, the Catholic Church celebrates the 1677th Anniversary of St. Macarius of Jerusalem's passage into his heavenly reward. As St. Paul taught us, we celebrate the lives of "so great a cloud of witnesses" (Heb. 12:1), the Saints Triumphant, so that we might "[b]e imitators of [them], as [they are] of Christ" (I Cor. 11:1). St. Macarius' example is one of steadfastness in Truth. When his episcopacy began, in A.D. 312, Christianity was still illegal in the Roman Empire. As a priest and before that a deacon, he constantly lived under the threat of imprisonment and death merely for believing in Christ, and no doubt witnessed not a few of his friends and acquaintances seized and slaughtered for the faith. It was only Divine Providence that preserved him from the same fate. Nevertheless, the gruesomeness of the Diocletianic Persecution was Macarius' daily life for a full decade, from A.D. 303 to 313.

          Thus, when Macarius became Archbishop of Jerusalem, he probably expected to be martyred for the Faith, yet he accepted the appointment and remained faithful to the Apostolic Teaching and to the local church in Jerusalem, as had the first Christians before him (cf. Acts 2:42). Then, a year later, the Emperors Constantine and Licinius together promulgated the Edict of Milan, once and for all making Christianity licit in the Roman Empire; there was no longer any threat of death simply for being Christian. Nevertheless, a new threat was growing: the Arian heresy. Though eventually nearly all the bishops of the East succumbed to Arius' demonic twisting of the Gospel─claiming that Jesus Christ was not co-eternal with the Father, but rather a created person, higher than us but lower than God─Macarius and only two others remained faithful to the eternal Truth passed down from the Apostles. Arius dared even to attempt to convince the Pope, Alexander, that Jesus was not "God from God, Light from Light, True God from True God," as the Nicene Council would later clarify, but of course he failed, because, as St. Cyprian of Carthage would later say when other heretics tried the same thing, this was "the throne of Peter, ... the chief church whence priestly unity takes its source; and [they did not] consider that these were the Romans whose faith was praised in the preaching of the Apostle, to whom faithlessness could have no access" (Epistle 54, §14). On returning to the East in defeat, the heresyarch wrote to his fellow Arian bishop, Eusebius of Nicomedia, complaining of his treatment:

     "[T]he bishop [of Rome, Pope Alexander I,] greatly wastes and persecutes us, and leaves no stone unturned against us. He has driven us out of the city as atheists, because we do not concur in what he publicly preaches, namely, 'God always, the Son always; as the Father so the Son; the Son co-exists unbegotten with God; He is everlasting; neither by thought nor by any interval does God precede the Son; always God, always Son; he is begotten of the unbegotten; the Son is of God Himself.' Eusebius, your brother bishop of Cæsarea, Theodotus, Paulinus, Athanasius, Gregorius, Aetius, and all the bishops of the East, have been condemned because they say that God had an existence prior to that of His Son; except Philogonius, Hellanicus, and Macarius, who are unlearned men, and who have embraced heretical opinions."

-Arius the Heresyarch (quoted by Theodoret, Ecclesiastical History, I, §4)

Theodoret confirms that the Macarius whom Arius says has "embraced heretical opinions" (i.e. has held to the very same orthodox, Apostolic "opinions" taught since the time of Christ, confirmed by Pope Alexander and later the Councils of Nicaea and Constantinople, and which we all still hold to today) was St. Macarius of Jerusalem. St. Macarius, trained for firmness of faith by the Roman persecutions that preceded his episcopacy, withstood the "wind of doctrine" (Eph. 4:14) that carried off so many of his fellow bishops. Though only three out of all the Eastern bishops withstood Arianism at first, the Creed written by Macarius and the other Council Fathers at Nicaea eventually stemmed the tide of the heresy and the Truth of the Apostles won out. But the question we must ask ourselves is, how did he do it? What grounded him in the Truth? What made him faithful when all around him became faithless?

          In the first half of the 4th century, there was no set canon of Scripture. All of the books we all use as Scripture now, including the ones the Catholic Church retains but the Protestant traditions reject, were being used in the Christian liturgy throughout the world, but each local church used their own set of them, and many also used other books as well. The debate about which ones were authoritative wouldn't even be brought to the fore for another fifty years or so. And, even though the majority of the Scriptures were used by all throughout the Church, it was with those very Scriptures that Arius was supporting his odious doctrines. The idea of Sola Scriptura was about as effective at defending against "every wind of doctrine" (Eph. 4:14) as it is today: not very. If you read enough of the Early Church Fathers, it becomes quite evident that the real litmus test of Truth was never the private interpretation of Scripture alone, but rather whether or not any given doctrine had been taught consistently from the days of the Apostles till the present. As St. Paul wrote, it is not the Scripture but "the Church of the Living God [that is] the pillar and bulwark of the Truth" (I Tim. 3:15). This is how St. Macarius knew how to tell the Truth of God from the lie. He refused to turn away from "that which [he had] received from [the Apostles]" (II Thess. 2:15; cf. I Cor. 11:2, Gal. 1:8-9, I Thess. 2:13, II Tim. 2:2, etc.). To be certain, the Scriptures contain the Truth, but only through the constant teaching of the Apostles and their successors throughout history can we know that we are interpreting them in keeping with that eternal Truth.

          From St. Macarius of Jerusalem, then, we can learn the importance of never giving in to the whims of our day. Like him, we are Christians first and foremost; the culture must never shape who we are or what we believe; on the contrary, we must hold to the Creed, to the timeless Truth of the Apostolic Teaching with such steadfast fortitude that nothing can shake our devotion to It─or rather, to Him, for Christ is the Truth (John 14:16)─so that the culture around us might rather be shaped by us. The Creed that St. Macarius and the Nicene Fathers, and after them St. Cyril of Jerusalem and the Constantinopolitan Fathers, wrote and handed down to us is like a massive Rock that stands amidst the raging river of history. The waters of time come roaring toward it with the same relentless force that has eroded mountains and devastated whole empires, but the Rock stands firm. When faced with that Rock upon which Christ built His Church, the water splits; the river is in the end shaped by the immovable force of the Rock. And this is how the Christian Faith, passed down from the 1st century to the 21st and on into eternity, shapes history. To be sure, some pieces of the Church-Rock chip off and fall into the stream, carried away by the currents of contemporary culture. But this Rock is itself build up by the Rock of Ages and even as it is eroded, God also renews and expands it, drawing more and more members into its bulk. "And I tell you, you are [Rock], and upon this Rock I will build My Church, and the powers of death shall not prevail against It" (Matt. 16:18, emphasis added).

          There are many fiendish winds of doctrine swirling about our heads in this current global culture of decadence and death, but the Truth is timeless and if we, like St. Macarius, buoy ourselves to that ancient (yet always new) Truth, to Christ and His Church, we alone shall weather the storm. But more than that, if we cast out the nets of Truth as we ourselves remain tethered to Him, telling all those around us how the timeless Teachings can bring them true joy and eternal safety, then as many as possible can be saved with us. St. Macarius too did not merely resolve to keep the Truth of Christ for himself, instead he joined all the bishops of his day to declare it in the Creed, and moreover he steadfastly passed it on to subsequent generations, following the admonition of St. Paul, "what you have heard from me before many witnesses entrust to faithful men who will be able to teach others also" (II Tim. 2:2), he entrusted it among others, I'm sure, to his deacon Cyril, who became St. Cyril of Jerusalem, a universal Doctor of the Church, whose writings are still widely read today. And so, to honor St. Macarius' evangelistic spirit, I'd like to end this meditation with a beautiful benediction from St. Cyril:

     "Now may He Himself, the God of all, who is Father of the Christ, and our Lord Jesus Christ, who came down, and ascended, and sits together with the Father, watch over your souls; keep unshaken and unchanged your hope in Him who rose again; raise you together with Him from your dead sins unto His heavenly gift; count you worthy to be 'caught up in the clouds, to meet the Lord in the air' (I Thess. 4:17), in His fitting time; and, until that time arrive of His glorious second advent, write all your names in the Book of the Living, and having written them, never blot them out (for the names of many, who fall away, are blotted out); and may He grant to all of you to believe in Him who rose again, and to look for Him who is gone up, and is to come again (to come, but not from the Earth; for be on your guard, O man, because of the deceivers who are to come); who sits on high, and is here present together with us, 'beholding the order of each, and the steadfastness of his faith' (Col. 2:5). For think not that because He is now absent in the flesh, He is therefore absent also in the Spirit. He is here present in the midst of us, listening to what is said of Him, and beholding your inward thoughts, 'and trying the reins and hearts'—who also is now ready to present those who are coming to baptism, and all of you, in the Holy Ghost to the Father, and to say, 'Behold, I and the children whom God has given Me':— To whom be glory for ever. Amen."

-St. Cyril of Jerusalem A.D. 347, Catechetical Lecture XIV, §30.

St. Macarius of Jerusalem, pray for us.

"To Fulfil All Righteousness"

or "Mary, Born Under the Law"
 
        Now, if we are to accept that it is fitting for Mary to have been immaculately conceived and to have remained sinless, we must confront the verses that seem to suggest otherwise. First and foremost, we come upon Luke 2:22-24 where Mary brings a sin offering to the Temple after the Birth of Jesus. It is only natural, especially for non-Jewish Christians, to look at this and say that, had Mary been sinless, she would not have needed to bring a sin offering to the Temple. This seems a simple enough explanation and so we accept it without examination, forgetting that it contradicts the doctrine that was clearly taught and believed by all Christians from the very beginning. Instead, I invite you to consider the larger context, and with it to examine the underlying assumption that propels this conclusion. We assume that, because it is called a "sin offering," it is always offered in consequence of having committed some sin or another. There is, of course, a problem with this logic. By the same reasoning, because Jesus, whom nearly every Christian church and tradition says was completely sinless His entire life, went to John the Baptiser to be baptised by him─keeping in mind that John's baptism was called by Mark "a baptism of repentance for the forgiveness of sins," (1:4, emphasis added)─then Jesus must've sinned, thus proving every Christian who ever lived to believe in something soundly unbiblical. This is not only the same logic used to conclude that Mary must've sinned simply because she offered a sin offering, but it also places the person who uses it in the same position: standing in direct opposition of centuries to Christianity and millions of Christians. We live roughly 2000 years distant from the events and persons in question; we ought to trust the testimony of those closest to the time of Jesus and Mary far more than we trust our own opinions. After all, our opinions are being built on the testimony of those very people with whom we're deciding to disagree.
        So, if we accept that Jesus was sinless, despite the fact that he received "a baptism of repentance for the forgiveness of sins," because it was "fitting for us to fulfil all righteousness" (Matthew 3:15), then why should we not accept that Mary's offerings at the Temple might have been made for the same reason: to fulfil the requirements of righteousness? Let's take a look at the biblical passage in question, considering the larger context and noting the emphasis made by the author:
 

    "And at the end of eight days, when He was circumcised, He was called Jesus, the name given to Him by the angel before He was conceived in the womb."

-Luke 2:21

 
In verse 21, Luke first, before mentioning what Jesus' parents do, tells of Jesus' circumcision on the eighth day.
        In the twelfth chapter of Leviticus, the book of the Law of Moses, we see both the command to circumcise male Jewish children and the command that the mother do exactly as Mary did, because of ritual uncleanness. Not personal sin, mind you, but ritual uncleanness. Before we go on, therefore, I'd like you to read that chapter; it's fairly short:
 

    "The Lord said to Moses, 'Say to the people of Israel, "If a woman conceives, and bears a male child, then she shall be unclean seven days; as at the time of her menstruation, she shall be unclean. And on the eighth day the flesh of his foreskin shall be circumcised. Then shall she continue for thirty-three days in the blood of her purifying; she shall not touch any hallowed thing, nor come into the sanctuary, until the days of her purifying are completed. But if she bears a female child, then she shall be unclean two weeks, as in her menstruation; and she shall continue in the blood of her purifying for sixty-six days.
     "And when the days of her purifying are completed, whether for a son or for a daughter, she shall bring to the priest at the door of the tent of meeting a lamb a year old for a burnt offering, and a young pigeon or a turtledove for a sin offering, and he shall offer it before the LORD, and make atonement for her; then shall she be clean from the flow of her blood. This is the law for her who bears a child, either male or female. And if she cannot afford a lamb, then she shall take two turtledoves or two young pigeons, one for a burnt offering and the other for a sin offering; and the priest shall make atonement for her, and she shall be clean."'"

-Leviticus 12

 
Most of us are so divorced from our Jewish roots that the phrase "ritually unclean" has little meaning beyond the theoretical. But for Mary, a woman born under the Law of Moses, from the moment of her first menstruation, becoming ritually unclean was a constant ordeal. According to the prevailing Catholic tradition that she was a consecrated Virgin─as has been discussed previously─that constant, repeated ritual uncleanness, which, as we see in the above section of Leviticus, is one of many, many ways she can become temporarily barred from entrance into the Temple, is the very reason her marriage to Joseph was arranged. If she did not have a home outside the Temple, with a man who was either her father or her spouse, she would be homeless roughly every four weeks. This is not a matter of personal sin, but merely a fact of Jewish life as a woman.
        Again, you'll note that there's no mention of the woman having sinned in giving birth. (Indeed, how could giving birth be a sin, if God is the God of Life?) She's simply required to bring a specific burnt offering and a specific sin offering so that she shall "be clean from the flow of her blood." These things were simply related to the ritual uncleanness that we talked about in regard to the Perpetual Virginity: because Mary is a woman who has a menstrual cycle, she becomes unclean periodically. The offerings that Luke tells us she brought to the temple are simply the things that she is required to bring, according to the Law of Moses as a consequence of giving birth to a child, which, just like a woman's regular menstrual cycle, causes a flow of blood. Since this is the reason for these specific sacrifices, it should be noted that they would not have been required except that Mary gave birth to the very Son of God; I should hope that no one considers giving birth to God Himself to be a sin...
        Returning to Luke, we read,
 

     "And when the time came for their purification according to the Law of Moses, they brought Him up to Jerusalem to present Him to the Lord (as it is written in the Law of the Lord, 'Every male that opens the womb shall be called holy to the Lord'), and to offer a sacrifice according to what is said in the Law of the Lord, 'a pair of turtledoves, or two young pigeons.' ... the parents brought in the Child Jesus, to do for Him according to the custom of the Law. ... And when they had performed everything according to the Law of the Lord, they returned to Galilee, to their own city, Nazareth."

-Luke 2:22-24, 27, 39 (emphases added)

 
With Leviticus 12 in mind, notice how many times Luke repeats, "according to the Law," or some variation thereof. When as a Protestant I looked at this section of the Gospel of Luke with patience and an open mind, I realized that it would take a sort of tunnel vision to look past this repeated affirmation that everything that Mary and Joseph did was "according to the Law" and instead take their profound obedience to the Law of the Old Covenant as proof that Mary had somehow broken that Law. If that were the intent of the author, then surely some specific example of sinning would have been necessary to override the profound insistence by St. Luke that "they had performed everything according to the Law of the Lord" (v. 39).
        All of these verses are written, not to show that Mary or anyone else was sinful, but rather the oposite: that they were perfectly obedient to the Law of Moses, under which they were all born. Jesus, whom even Paul admits was "born under the Law" (Galatians 4:4), is circumcised in accordance with that Law. Likewise, His mother, who was not only born under the Law but was also a woman, brings sacrifices to the Temple in accordance with the Law. As Leviticus 12 makes abundantly clear, the reason the sacrifices were necessary was not because of any personal sin or moral deficiency, but because she was made ritually unclean by the mere act of giving birth, because of "the flow of her blood." She offered them not to make up for sinfulness, but rather "to fulfil all righteousness," just as her Son did through His Baptism.

Questions Obama & Sebelius Don't Want You to Answer

The proponents of the HHS mandate are attempting to divert people's attention away from the fact that it is blatantly unconstitutional and that it threatens the very foundation and future of everything this country stands for. But I submit that the way in which they are diverting that attention is inherently self-defeating. What is the battle cry of the pro-mandate crowd?

"Why is the Catholic Church dead-set against preventive health care?"

The people who ask this question simply want you to be incensed that the Church is so "backward, idiotic, and behind the times." The very last thing they want you to do is actually think about the answer. That is precisely why I would now like to present you with that answer: because it is quite simple, logical, and, in today's culture, revolutionary. The Catholic Church, and many, many others, are against the so-called "preventive health care services" of artificial contraception, FDA-approved abortifacients, and sterilizations because, simply put, they neither prevent ill-health, nor constitute any actual form of health care.

MedTerms.com defines preventive medicine as "Medicine designed to avert and avoid disease." If contraceptives and abortifacients are to fall into this category, then their purpose must be "to avert or avoid disease." But is it? No. They are used for exactly the opposite purpose: they are used "to avert or avoid [life itself]"! I have always been taught that ingested substances used for that purpose are called poisons. It is forthis reason that the Catholic Church opposes them. The Catholic Church values life above all else, because she service the God of Life; thus she has always and shall always opposed poisons, which artificial contraceptives and abortifacients are.

As for sterilizations, they are not only undertaken to prevent life (which is the ultimate anti-disease), but they do so by taking previously healthy and properly functioning organ systems, and disrupting or ceasing their function. This, again, is not health care, it is the textbook definition of mutilation, something that true health care seeks to prevent and correct. This is why the Catholic Church also opposes sterilizations. Allow me to quote Dr. Taylor Marshall:

"Contraception is contrary to natural law. The male and female procreative organs naturally come together to procreate a child. The word procreate includes the term "create" since a new life is made. In the case of humans, a new immortal soul is created by God when the father and mother come together and conceive a new person. As Peter Kreeft said, the most holy place on earth is the altar where the Eucharist is consecrated - the second most holy place is the woman's body since it form there that new immortal souls spring forth. The procreative organs naturally function for procreation. That is why God made them as they are. To frustrate the act (interruptus or barrier) is gravely sinful. To poison the body with hormones so as to inhibit the woman's natural cycle of fertility (birth control pill) is gravely sinful. To cut out or purposefully scar procreative organs (sterilization) is gravel sinful. These acts seek to destroy what is natural."
     -"6 Reasons Contraception is Sinful and Contrary to God's Will," Canterbury Tales blog, Feb. 15, 2012.

The people who ask you, "Why does the Catholic Church oppose health care?" do not want you to realize these obvious medical facts. Their very question purports a lie. The Catholic Church not only supports actual, preventive and corrective health care, but it also, for generation upon generation, has actively created some of the most widely respected hospital and health systems throughout the entire world, including all over this country. Virtually every Catholic hospital and health system is not only known for excellence but also for compassionate service. And do you want to know why? It's because we are committed to only offering those medicines and services which actually improve health. We truly believe the Hipocratic Oath that every doctor takes, the oath that promises "to do no harm." Last time I checked, preventing the creation and implantation of human life is the very definition of harmful. Last time I checked, mutilating human organs is the text-book definition of harmful.

My wife is about to graduate from Medical School precisely because she is 100% Catholic and 100% devoted to providing quality health care to every American. She just so happens to also believe that it is wrong to do constant, daily harm to the female body, especially when the manner of doing so (e.g. "the pill") is a known cause of cancer. Look it up. Learn the truth. Oppose the wildly unconstitutional HHS Mandate.

"Thou This Be Madness, There Is [Even More Madness] In't."

     Given all the outrage over the Obama Administration's absolutely unconscionable violation of every American citizen's First Amendment right to freedom of conscience, freedom of religion, and freedom of speech, I thought it would be helpful to take a step back from the talk of what's at stake, and look first at why it's at stake. It occurred to me that, as Polonius put it, "Though this be madness, there is method in't" (Hamlet, Act II, Scene 2). Or, in the case of Obama et alii, "Though this be madness, there is [even more madness] in't." From what anyone can tell, the sole intent of all the mandating that Obama and Sebelius are doing is to ensure that every single American (and more especially, every single woman) possible can have utterly unfettered access to contraception, and if that doesn't work, then to abortifacients (i.e. drugs that prevent the conceived embryo [read: microscopic baby] from safely emplanting in his/her mommy's womb), and if they'd rather not deal with those options, then to outright sterilization. Okay, fine. If someone wants these things, they're already readily available all over the country, and I can't and won't force them to stop doing/using them or to see them as wrong. That's their right human beings to make up their own minds and live with the consequences of their own choices. (That, of course, is not at all to say that I do not support those who want to re-criminalize the murder of innocent pre-born persons that we blithely refer to as "abortion.") But why the mandate the other way, why force Americans to not only see them as right, but also force every American to pay for them? Why shove all these things down our throats? Why not just let everyone believe and do whatever they want regarding these things? What's the ultimate goal behind the game plan? What's the "win" for Obama and friends?

     The only end-game I can see is that he hopes to de-populate the country. (Perhaps I'm just too far-sighted. Obama probably only sees as far as the dollar signs he gets from his backers at Planned Parenthood for pushing their agenda.) I mean, think about it. What is the purpose of every one of the things he's forcing everyone to pay for? The answer: No Babies. They want as many Americans as possible to be able to have no babies. The consequence of that kind of policy is, inevitably, fewer tax-paying American citizens every year; translation: more retirees with no young, active, working-age Americans to take care of them. (Want an example of this: look at the demographics of Europe at this moment.) This leads to─oh wait, this has already happened. Ammendment: this has led to an exponentially increasing national debt as the Federal Government has no choice but to cover the ever-increasing needs of the evermore abundant (relative to the overall population, of course) unemployed Americans. It seems to me that we're already in this downward spiral, yet what is the solution of the President who has spent more than dozens (possibly all) of his predecessors combined in just four painfully-long years? Simple: his solution is apparently to increase the speed of the whirlpool that's sucking America down the drain. His solution to the problems of under-employment and an imploding economy is to torpedo the next generation at its very source─the very first moments of human life─guaranteeing that, the further into debt we get, the fewer people we'll have to pay off that debt.

     I was under the impression that the role of government is to work for the good of the country, to ensure that said country has a more prosperous future than it had a past. Or, at the very minimalist least, the role of government is to ensure that said government has a country to govern in the future. Yet, this madman's mandate seems bent on the exact opposite of any of these fundamental roles of government. His sole consideration in all of this is clearly to make sure that every future as-yet-unborn American could be ensured a completely trouble-free exit-visa from planet Earth before they ever even see that planet. (For now, at least, whether their parents choose to use those exit-visas is up to us... but I don't hold out any hope that even that liberty will remain ours for long. Just look at China...) The Obama Administration mandates that we make it as easy as humanly possible for this generation of American citizens to obliterate the next generation of America citizens.

     Again, either there's something I don't see that he thinks he gains from this insane blotting out of the future of this country, or he just wants to see how badly he can screw up the United States before his term(s) is/are up. Honestly, the whole thing is utterly senseless to me. There is as little rational basis for this mandate as there is in the government encouraging monogamous "marriage" between two people whose gametes are completely incompatible (resulting in 0% capacity for offspring) when the only way the government can continue to exist itself is if this generation produces offspring over which it can govern. This whole business of "reproductive freedom," which is really the hedonistic freedom from reproduction, and "'marriage' equality," which is really the divorce of marriage from its primary purpose─the creation and education of children─is incredibly short-sighted, selfish, and self-defeating because all it can lead to is the depopulation of the very same society that enforces it. There is literally no future in this mentality.

     Now, all this is still just the background to the overt action of this blatantly death-minded President. In service of this nationally suicidal goal, he has now "accommodated" the religious organizations that object to providing these hateful things by telling them that 100% of all insurance policies─not the 99% or 98% that were previously required to; no, now it's fully 100%─throughout this country must now include the pill, the morning-after pill (read: abortifacient), and complete sterilization, thus removing even the pathetically narrow exemption that was previously allowed to perhaps 1% of those who object. How is this a "concession," according to the Administration? Simple. He claims that the objecting employers "will not pay" for those "services", just for all the others listed on the insurance plans (the same plans which must include the objectionable "services"). So who pays for the objectionable portion? Simple. "The insurance companies." Are they being paid directly by some agency or advocacy group that employs only those who support these "services" and garnders funds only from others who support them, so that those who object don't provide the money? Nope. They use "internal funds" which, obviously, only have one place to come from: those paying for insurance plans. Translation, 100% of Americans, whether they object to these morally questionable "services" or not, are providing the funds that will be used to pay for them. But, at least we can "feel better" about it because Obama promises that he'll insist that every single insurance company in the United States launders the money prior to filing their financial statements.

To summarize, let me say that again as simply as possible:

     The pathetically narrow exemption in the original HHS mandate has been completely revoked. Now the full 100% of all insurance plans everywhere in the U.S. must include the morally objectionable content (contraception, abortifacient drugs, and sterilization). And, to top it all off, he's added yet another morally objectionable (and, in point of fact, illegal) practice to the nation-wide mandate: forced nation-wide money laundering.

     There's a reason Planned Parenthood (P.P.) is happy with this new "compromise": it's worse than before, includes more evil, and forces many, many more companies across this country to engage in the very same money laundering shell-game that P.P. has been using to claim that the millions that the government has been giving them yearly "aren't being used for abortions," despite the fact that they're the largest abortion provider in the country (and perhaps the world and their primary goal, every year, is to increase the number of abortions they do).

     I implore you all, no matter your beliefs about contraceptives and sundry: oppose this mandate more now than you did before. If you don't want the government to be able to deny you your right to think for yourself, go to StopHHS.com and sign the petition. President Obama has now made it undeniably clear that he doesn't just want to abolish most people's First Amendment rights, he fully intends to revoke those Constitutionally guaranteed rights for absolutely every American citizen. We must fight this atrocious law, or face the end of America as we know it... forever... in more ways than one.

St. Macarius of Jerusalem

    St. Macarius of Jerusalem, described by St. Athanasius as being of "the honest and simple style of apostolical men," was Archbishop of the Holy City from A.D. 312-335. His name, which in Greek is, Μακάριος, means "Blessed" and is the same word that Jesus uses to pronounce the Beatitudes at the beginning of the Sermon on the Mount (cf. Matthew 5:3-12). St. Athanasius and others─even the heretic Arius himself, who specifically cursed the archbishop─also attest to the unwavering orthodoxy of Macarius.

    
    Only one document that St. Macarius wrote remains extant: a letter he sent during the final year of his life and episcopate to the Church in Armenia. It reveals a thriving church in Jerusalem, with an exceedingly reverential liturgical life. It speaks mostly about recommendations to correct the laxness of the Armenian hierarchy and liturgical life of that time, but in the process it also shows us a glimpse of the theology and practice of the Church in Jerusalem under the governance of Macarius, especially regarding Baptism and the Holy Eucharist. Interestingly, the letter specifically witnesses to the practice of infant baptism2 in the Early Church.
 
    St. Macarius' letter also refers to "the holy Council which was held because of the heretics," meaning the First Nicene Council, which St. Macarius himself attended. Many other sources also attest to his presence there, and the seventh canon of that council even guarantees his autonomy in relation to the Caesarean eparchy, which some take to mean that there was a dispute between the two over jurisdiction. It is also believed that St. Macarius, along with Eustathius of Antioch, was particularly involved in the drafting of the Creed declared by that holy Council.
 
    Around the time of the Council, which took place in A.D. 325, Macarius also assisted St. Helena, Queen Mother of the Roman Emperor Constantine the Great, in locating the True Cross of Christ and other implements of the Lord's Passion. According to ancient sources, the Holy Cross was hidden by the Jews after His Resurrection, and its location remained a secret among a select few, until one of them, named Judas, was inspired by God to reveal its location to Sts. Helena and Macarius. Once the excavation took place, they found three crosses at the bottom of a dried-up cistern, along with the Crown of Thorns, and the Titulus with Herod's inscription, "Iesus Nazarenus, Rex Iudæorum" (John 19:19), etc. Unfortunately, the Titulus was no longer attached to the True Cross, so they did not know how to distinguish It from the thieves' crosses. Providencially, however, the Holy Spirit led St. Macarius to instruct them to carry the three crosses to the bedside of a worthy dying woman. The first two crosses had no effect on her, but the touch of the third, the Holy Cross of Christ, completely healed her. Thus, the True Cross was identified. The same Judas subsequently converted to the Christian faith, took the name Cyriacus, and is likewise honoured by the Church as a Saint. Tyrannius Rufinus, an Italian monk and historian, records that St. Macarius prayed this prayer over the woman before trying the crosses:

"O Lord, who by the Passion of Thine only Son on the cross, didst deign to restore salvation to mankind, and who even now hast inspired thy handmaid Helena to seek for the blessed wood to which the author of our salvation was nailed, show clearly which it was, among the three crosses, that was raised for Thy glory. Distinguish it from those which only served for a common execution. Let this woman who is now expiring return from death's door as soon as she is touched by the wood of salvation."

Following this discovery, Emperor Constantine himself wrote to St. Macarius,7 requesting that he oversee the construction of a magnificent church, the Basilica of the Holy Sepulchre, to commemorate the sites of the Crucifixion and Burial of Christ where the three Saints had unearthed the precious relics of the Passion.
 
    Aside from these things, we only know that St. Macarius likely presided over the deaconal ordination of St. Cyril of Jerusalem, whose Catechetical Lectures earned Cyril the title "Doctor of the Church," and from Macarius Cyril too inherited the ire of the Arians for his unwavering orthodoxy, but experienced their wrath much more concertedly than did the elder Saint.